Echoes of the Farplane
by Jewels
Summary: Spira is coming to terms with the fact that Sin is no more, but Yevon does not take the shift in power so kindly and will use Yuna, and the secrets she carries, to their own ends.
1. End of the Beginning

Title: Echoes of the Farplane  
  
Author: Jewels  
  
Email: jhantor@yahoo.com  
  
Disclaimer: Squaresoft owns the Final Fantasy series. Not I.  
  
Summary: Spira is coming to terms with the fact that the monster that has plagued them for a thousand years is no more, but Yevon and those who ruled do not take the sudden shift in power so kindly and are willing to use Yuna, and the secrets she carries, to their own ends.  
  
Notes: This story has no relevance or bearing on FFX-2 (not that I would know, since at this time, even though the game has been released in the US, us UK types will not get it until next February). It proceeds into a leisurely AU just after the end of FFX.  
  
**  
  
Part One: End of the Beginning  
  
**  
  
The breeze that swept through the air lifted the edges of Yuna's veil, causing it to ripple tantilisingly against her skin, a gentle caress of fabric. She captured a fold of the translucent material between her fingertips, thoughtfully rubbing her thumb and forefinger together. It felt expensive. It was barely a featherweight as it draped over her body, and she thought she could detect barely visible patterns woven into the sheer fabric. Yuna knew, without a doubt, that it had cost the Temple a small fortune to make her dress and its accoutrements, but she also knew that it was barely a drop in the ocean of Yevon's wealth. When you ruled the world, money tended not to be any object.  
  
She wondered if she had ever, for one minute, dreamed that her wedding day would be like this. That she would stand high above Bevelle in the bright sunlight, surrounded by the Maesters of Spira and the monks, dressed in finery that would have taken her a lifetime to save enough to buy, about to be wed to one of those same Maesters.  
  
But then, once she had set her mind upon becoming a Summoner, she had never thought that she would ever be wed. She had thought she would never have the chance.  
  
There wasn't much sound, only the sounds of the bells which resounded throughout the city, combined with the shuffling footsteps of the monks and guards, their tread muffled by the plush carpet. Yuna kept waiting to hear someone clear their throat idly, or whisper to their neighbour, but there was nothing. No one dared disrupt this occasion which Yevon was apparently putting so much effort into. Even Yuna's bouquet had been carefully arranged by a junior priestess who blessed the flowers. Or she at least had with the second bouquet. Yuna had shredded the first one in her anxiety, fingers plucking the delicate blooms apart. The junior priestess had not been pleased.  
  
She contemplated shredding the new bunch of flowers that she clutched, and although she eventually decided that it wouldn't accomplish anything, the idea that making such a mess in this orderly, Yevon-controlled event was a tempting one. If she hadn't been so worried that one of the guards might shoot her for it. She idly wondered whether casting a protective barrier would protect her from the wrath of the guards.  
  
Yuna decided she was getting faintly hysterical, if she was fretting over the consequences for destroying a bunch of flowers.  
  
She was all too aware of the man that appeared from the opposite side of the platform, crossing to her side and gracing her with a smile that contained an overtone of triumph to it. His footsteps were soft, muffled by the plush red carpet that adorned the open-air platform, but they were almost like thunder to her ears.  
  
"Are you ready?" Seymour's words were spoken softly, and he laid an arm on hers.  
  
'No,' she wanted to say, 'No, and I never will be,' before throwing off his arm and fleeing Bevelle as fast as she could run. But she could not get past the guards at the door, and if she was to finish her self-imposed task here today, she had to carry on with this charade of a wedding.  
  
So instead, she gave him a smile, if a rather faint one, and turned to face down the aisle where onlookers and guards alike gazed back at her.  
  
There was a sense of unreality to it all as she started the walk, her eyes fixed firmly ahead of her, and in some distant part of her mind was hoping that she wouldn't trip over her veil. The rest of her chided her for caring about the matter. The truth was, a part of her wished it was different. So easily she could have fallen for Seymour, seeing his strength during the debacle at Mushroom Rock Road.   
  
But the weight of her staff, where she had unscrewed it into two shorter sections and hidden it within the folds of her dress, pressed down on her, a physical reminder of what she was to do. She would wait until the attention of Spira and the guards were focussed on Seymour alone, and then she would send him. All Spira would see the half-Guado for who he was: clinging desperately to his own life, even after he had taken that of his father.  
  
She stopped at the top of the stairs, not glancing at Seymour as he took his position beside her, and gripped her bouquet in a tense, nervous grip that caused the stems to crack beneath her fingers. She forced herself to relax and breathe easily, presenting only a cool and calm exterior to the crowd and guards alike.  
  
But there was something wrong.  
  
Maester Mika was laboriously making his way through the ceremonial words, his voice unsteady. He had to stop every once in a while to catch his breath. Yuna half expected Seymour to look impatient, but instead he looked serene, uncaring almost. She supposed this was just a formality to him, a public way of acknowledging that there was some sort of connection between a Maester of Yevon and a Summoner. She still could not work out why he was so set on their being together.  
  
The wrongness of the situation nagged at her, that all was not as it should be. Knowledge skittered at the edge of her consciousness like pond skaters dancing across water. It was there, but it would not cause ripples to let her know what it was.  
  
"And you, Yuna, daughter of the Lord High Summoner Braska, do you consent to this union?"  
  
She didn't hear Maester Mika at first. So intent was she on the answer to a question she hadn't worked out yet. She didn't realise that she was being addressed until Seymour turned and looked down at her, drawing her attention outside of herself again.  
  
"Lady Yuna, do you consent?"  
  
Yuna hesitated, opening her mouth but uttering no sound. She turned away from Seymours intent gaze, turning her face skywards and feeling the sun warm her skin through the veil. She squinted, staring up towards the clouds. Where was the ship? Where was the Al Bhed machina vessel that came plunging through the cloud layer, delivering her Guardians? Surely they should have been there by now.  
  
Shouldn't they?  
  
"Lady Yuna?"  
  
She ignored Maester Mika's tremulous questioning, eyes desperately searching the vastness of sky. It was clear blue for the most part. But she knew she should be seeing pyrefiles by their hundreds, singing tunelessly as they drifted back down to earth. But the only flash of oily hues that she could see quickly turned out to be the flip of the Guardian Wyrm, Evrae's, wings. The creature was pinwheeling in the sky, apparently enjoying its aerial freedom as it guarded the city.  
  
"Lady Yuna?"  
  
Seymour this time, punctuating his query with a tightening of his grip on her wrist. She muffled a gasp, startled out of her panicked searching and looked into his face. She imagined she could see pyreflies dancing behind his eyes.  
  
"Yuna? Lady Yuna?"  
  
Yuna cracked open one eye, staring up at the face hanging over her bed.  
  
"It was awfully hard to wake you," Shelinda said, fretfully, as she plucked at her sleeve with the fingers of one hand. "I was beginning to think I'd have to resort to something drastic."  
  
"Bad dreams," Yuna murmured thickly, rubbing her eyes to rid them of sleepsand. "It's nothing."  
  
"To do with Sin?"  
  
Yuna hesitated, debating the matter with herself before she gave Shelinda the smallest of smiles. "Yes," she said, looking at the ground.  
  
"Oh!" Shelinda clutched her hands to her chest and shook her head. "How dreadful! And how awful of me to not think that someone who defeated Sin might not still be troubled by it. You're so strong, Lady Yuna."  
  
Yuna bit her tongue to prevent herself from answering the sentiment honestly. "What's the matter, Shelinda?" she asked, running a hand through her hair in an attempt to flatten it into something managable. She used her other hand to push herself into a sitting position, feeling the instant deprivation of cosy warmth as her sheets fell away. "It's far too early, isn't it?"  
  
"It's that Al-Bhed girl, Rikky..."  
  
"Rikku," Yuna correctly gently, rubbing her eyes free of grit and blinking up at the Captain of the Guard.  
  
Shelinda's expression was one of sudden realisation. Yuna had a feeling Rikku hadn't reacted well to the mispronunciation. "Oh. Yes. Um... well, she's demanding we get you out of bed. Quite insistent about it, she was. She says that a Mr. Pops will be here presently to pick you up."  
  
Now Yuna was convinced that Rikku had making fun of the Yevonite. Her cousin had never really forgiven the woman for spouting the 'evil Al-Bhed' line the last time they had set foot in Bevelle. In fact, Yuna was convinced that Rikku had volunteered to spend most of her time guarding the room that Yevon had given Yuna during her stay just to irk Shelinda.  
  
After shooing the woman away, Yuna quickly changed out of the ill-fitting sleeping garments that Yevon had supplied her with. They had felt alien and uncomfortable, and she was glad to be back into her own clothes. She started when she came out from behind the changing screen and found Shelinda still there, fidgeting impatiently by the doorway.  
  
Outside stood Wakka, Lulu, Kimahri and Rikku, the last of which was running a fingertip across the edge of her claw contemplatively, before looking significantly at Shelinda, who swallowed audibly. Yuna fought the urge to roll her eyes and crossed over the floor of the antechamber to her Guardians with a smile of greeting.  
  
"Yuna, you are ready?"  
  
As Yuna indicated she was indeed, Lulu nodded and glanced towards the nervous seeming Captain of the Guard, and asked, "I assume that the city forces are prepared for the arrival of the airship and there will be no untoward incidents?" When the Al-Bhed craft had first arrived in Bevelle, a rather nervous warrior monk had started taking potshots at the craft before a well aimed water spell, courtesy of Lulu, had put a dampener on his fighting spirit.  
  
Shelinda shook her head, the tassels on her headgear bouncing with the motion. "Oh no! Of course not, I've given orders that everyone is to remain calm and that the airship carries the High Summoner and her Guardians. There won't be a repeat of that most regrettable incident."  
  
Yuna inclined her head gracefully, "Thank you for your consideration," she said.  
  
Shelinda bobbed in a little curtsey. "Please follow me, m'lady Yuna. The Bevelle council and guards wish to officially grant you farewell."  
  
Shelinda hurried from the room, and with a smile at her Guardians, Yuna followed the Captain out of the palace and into the brisk morning air.  
  
**  
  
She had come to Bevelle to talk to Yevon, and with all its Maesters dead and gone, there was something of a confusion about who she should speak to. It had been hard enough to get into the city, but some judicious wheedling and a long conversation with Shelinda and Isaaru had meant that Yuna and her much diminished entourage were allowed to enter and seek and audience. Eventually, it had been decided to bring some of the higher ranking priests and priestesses, as well as the leaders of the warrior monks, to one of the larger offices that had been abandoned by its occupant, Maester Mika. Everything was cleared out, a simple oval table with enough chairs for everyone being placed inside. Everyone who would be taking part in the discussions, of course. Yuna's guardians had been forced to remain standing, though no amount of glaring could persuade them to leave their charge alone in the room with the Yevon clergy.  
  
Yuna had come to talk to them for one very simple reason: she wanted them to reopen the city, to allow the people who lived there to return to their homes. She wanted them to send the warrior monks back out to help protect Spira from the fiends that roved the world, and who had become a much greater threat to travellers since the Yevon Church had withdrawn into itself.  
  
"The terror that was Sin is gone," she had argued, standing at the head of the table and resting her hands on the overpolished surface. "The people need the protection that was denied them or the wandering fiends will pick off those the weakened Crusaders can no longer defend."  
  
Unfortunately, it seemed that the clergy weren't focussing on what Yuna wished they would.  
  
One the younger women in the room, a priestess by her robes and adornments, shook her head sharply. "Sin is gone for now," she said, heavily. "It is only a matter of time before Sin returns to us."  
  
"Sin is gone," Yuna repeated, calmly, straightening and folding her hands before her. "And will not be coming back."  
  
"And where," asked the High Priest of Bevelle, a man as large as his ego, "Is the proof of what you say? Four times Sin has been defeated and each time it has returned."  
  
"Sin was sent, as was the creature that created him, and moreover," Yuna took a deep breath, before plunging ahead, "The Fayth will no longer serve to protect the people of Spira. Their work is done, and they sleep."  
  
The High Priest scoffed loudly. "High Summoner Yuna, with all due respect, it is simply ridiculous to think thusly. The aeons are the only thing standing between Spira and its destruction. The Fayth would not abandon us."  
  
"There is an easy way to check," Yuna said. "Enter the Chamber of the Fayth and see the dead statue for yourselves."  
  
There was a sudden upsurge of sound within the room, the majority of the assembled clergy suddenly furious at the suggestion of deliberate blasphemy. But High Priestess with the white hair shifted uncomfortably and found the great windows that looked out on the city suddenly fascinating. Yuna knew, without a doubt, that the priestess had gone against temple laws, and had broken into the Chamber of the Fayth to see for herself what had happened.   
  
Yuna knew, of course, because she had seen the suddenly cold stone forms that lined a wall on Mount Gagazet. It had been the closest place that she had been able to think of at the time where she could see what had happened to the Fayth. Still reeling from the shock of everything that had happened, she had stroked a hand over the cold stone shoulder at what might have once been an old woman, and thought that someday in the future someone might just mistake all of this for a massive and bizarre sculpture carved into the very rock of the mountain.  
  
She wondered distantly if that was a bad thing.  
  
"I believe we are straying from the point."  
  
The voice was female, strident, and carried such a ring of authority that the chatter which had been dominating the room instantly fell silent. All eyes turned to the speaker, and there was not a little intimidation in them.  
  
"The High Summoner is right," it was the white-haired priestess that was speaking, fixing Yuna with an equally pale-eyed gaze. "At least on some level. It does us no good to keep Bevelle closed off from Spira, and from its people. We only distance ourselves from the people." She left unspoken what was doubtless on everyone's mind.  
  
/And if she is right, then distance will become an absence as we are forgotten by them./  
  
There was a certain amount of grumbling that washed around the room, but it seemed that Yuna had won her argument. The priestess, who Yuna would later learn was called Ismene, though, was saying nothing, but staring at Yuna with an oddly sharp look in her eye that caused Yuna no end of discomfort.   
  
"Besides which," Ismene finished, with a wry and brittle twist to her mouth. "She is the High Summoner. Openingly refusing a request from such an august personage would hardly be appropriate."  
  
Yuna couldn't admit to being fond of that sentiment at all. As if she were the only person of worth listening to in Spira. She was rather grateful when the High Priest declared an end to the days discussion, and requested that Yuna stay the night to rest and refresh herself. It gave her an opportunity to be with her friends, her guardians, and out of that room of people who only thought of themselves, and what they could wrest from the people of Spira.  
  
She made her sick to think of it, and she did her best to put it out of her mind.  
  
**  
  
Brother had apparently improved in his piloting skills since the Al-Bhed had dropped Yuna off, as he seemed to be showing off somewhat as he manoeuvred into position close to the Highbride which was the main road into Bevelle. He at first seemed to be approaching far too fast, and there were startled yells from the watching Warrior Monks, a few of whom ducked. Just before he got to the point where he would either crash into or overshoot the bridge entirely, the airship spun on its axis, just about clearing the top of the bridge, and winding up at a deadstop on the other side, facing in the direction it had come from. Moments after it came to a stop and as the descaling whine of the engines shifting into an idling state ran through the air, a doorway low down on the ship opened, and two goggled Al-Bhed pushed a gangway from the ship to the bridge.  
  
Beside Wakka, Rikku giggled at the mingled shock and surprise that was so broadly apparent on the faces of the assembled Yevonites, who had all gathered to see the High Summoner on her way.   
  
"You'd think they'd never seen a flying ship before," Rikku declared loudly, grabbing Yuna's bag and swinging it over her shoulder as she hopped onto the extended gangway and entered the ship, cheerfully ignoring the mutterings and glares that had been caused by her words.   
  
Lulu smothered a laugh, before hitching up her skirt a few inches and striding confidently up into the interior of the ship, followed closely by Wakka. Yuna started up the gangway, but paused midway up, turning back to the assembled crowd, who were crying out their farewalls. She started to wave to them, but the figure of High Priestess Ismene standing at the back of the crowd caught her attention. Ismene had a hard expression on her face, her arms folded.   
  
Feeling somewhat chilled, Yuna climbed the rest of the way into the airship.  
  
**  
  
Yuna was staring out of the large windows of the airship's deck when Rikku found her.   
  
"Kimahri said you were up here," she said, clasping her hands behind her back and dancing on the spot in a sign of nervousness. "You've been awfully quiet."  
  
"Relief, I think," Yuna said, turning away from the vista, "I've always known my purpose was to defeat Sin, and now it's done, though we lost so much." She trailed off, looking distant.  
  
Rikku tried not to think too hard about all those things she had lost, as Yuna had. She kept thinking that if she did, she'd wind up sitting in a corner of the engine room, crying her eyes out. "But its over now. You can go Home," she said.  
  
Something about the way her cousin said that caught Yuna's attention. "Rikku?" she prompted, her expression curiosity.  
  
"Pops he... heh..." Rikku shifted on the spot, looking at a badly welded spot on the bulkhead for a moment in order to avoid her cousin's eyes. "He wants me to help with the reconstruction effort. You know, with finding a new place to call Home and building a place for Al Bhed."  
  
"And you want to go and help him," Yuna finished for her, gently amused at Rikku's awkwardness, and the way her words made the Al Bhed girl whip her head around and shake it frantically.  
  
"No, no, I want to protect you, Yunie. But I..." Rikku trailed off, looking somewhat miserable. "But yeah, I want to help. A lot of people decided to settle elsewhere, but many want to just be with Al Bhed, they still want their Home. You understand, right, Yunie?"  
  
Yuna smiled, reaching out to clasp her cousin's wrist. "Of course I do, Rikku. I don't need protecting from my guardians anymore. I am not a Summoner any longer, and I need no guarding from the people of Besaid. But though I no longer need my guardians, I do need my friends. You will visit, won't you?"  
  
In response, Rikku threw her arms around Yuna in a bone crushing hug, practically squeezing the air out of her lungs. "Of course, silly," she said, though Yuna could hear the quaver of withheld tears in her voice. "As if Father would let me stay away. He's so proud that /his/ niece is the one to have defeated Sin, and without getting killed as well."  
  
Just when Yuna was beginning to wonder how long she could last without breathing, Rikku released her and stepped back.   
  
"It just feels so strange to even think about it," Rikku confessed, "After journeying so long. It's hard to believe that it's even over."  
  
"Spira is free," Yuna said, softly, "We should all have a very long time to get used to the idea."  
  
"Used to the idea that we can sail boats wherever we want, without fear of Sin appearing to destroy us? Used to the idea that we can build and it won't be destroyed and the people killed? Yes, that will take a long time." Rikku smiled brilliantly, "I can't wait to start."  
  
"And I," Yuna said, "Can't wait to sleep in my own bed, for as long as I like."  
  
"No more damp bedrolls and drafty tents," Rikku continued, in a sing-song voice. "No more half-stale trail rations and Tidus' stew..." She hesitated slightly at the name, but Yuna showed no reaction. At first, the Guardians had all been rather hesitant to talk about the blonde man from Zanarkand, but Yuna had been clear that she would rather talk about him, and be reminded of him, than be afraid to speak his name and think of his voice. "No more of Wakka's map-reading skills," she finished.  
  
Yuna chuckled. "Things I won't miss." She shook her head. "But I will miss everyone," she added, soberly.  
  
Rikku gave her another smaller hug, which Yuna was rather relieved she cut short. "You want to come down below? They put some food out in one of the common areas."  
  
"I don't feel like food, I'm afraid. The motion of the ship is turning my stomach somewhat," Yuna said, returning her eyes to the sight of the ocean speeding along far beneath the ship. "Watching the view seems to help."  
  
Rikku frowned worriedly. "You never got sick before. Do you want me to see if there's a medic? They might be able to help."  
  
Yuna shook her head, turning back to her cousin. "No, don't worry about me. I'm probably just tired. I feel like I haven't slept for days, even though I remember awakening this morning. It'll do me good to get back to Besaid, I think."  
  
"Are you sure?" Rikku asked, "Won't take a minute-"  
  
"Rikku," Yuna said firmly, "I'm fine. Go and get something to eat."  
  
Rikky recognised a dismissal when she heard one, and she was far too comfortable in her role as a Guardian to do anything less than obey. "Alright, but if it does get worse, you will talk to someone?"  
  
A pause, and then Yuna nodded. Relenting, Rikku headed belowdecks to a buffet spread of rehydrated rations.  
  
**  
  
The airship landed as close as it could to the pier at Besaid, it being the perfect place to extend the gangplank without mostly submerging the ship. After having spent most of the past few months trying to restore the vessel, the Al-Bhed engineers had threatened grievous harm to anyone who ordered the undoing of all their work by dunking the mechanical ship in saltwater. The moment that Yuna stepped down from the quietly floating ship and onto the wooden planks from which the pier was constructed, she felt a wave of relief at feeling ground which didn't vibrate and sway beneath her feet. It was very quickly followed by a wave of nausea.  
  
Clapping a hand over her mouth, and followed by an anxious looking Wakka, Yuna knelt down at the edge of the pier, stared down at the softly rippling surface of the water, and proceeded to divest herself of what little remained of her breakfast.  
  
"S'alright, Yuna," Wakka muttered, rubbing her back gently. "We're back on land now, ya? You'll be ok."  
  
Yuna muttered something incoherent and miserable, before she clambered to her feet, dabbing at her mouth with a hankerchief that Lulu produced from somewhere, before smiling tremulously as she turned towards the beach, and the villagers who'd spotted the airship approaching. At least she had been spared the indignity of vomiting in front of them.  
  
Then she was distracted as little Bela, the child who had sobbed so on her departure from Besaid, ran up to her and into her arms, and Yuna smiled, feeling like she had finally come home.  
  
**  
  
Cid grimaced as he watched his niece retch over the side of the pier and poked his daughter in the shoulder when he caught her making a disgusted face. "None of that," he told her, "The girl's defeated Sin. She's allowed to get a bit airsick on a flight, especially when someone hasn't fixed the damned motion dampners yet!"  
  
The object of his bellow, Brother, just yelled something unrepeatable back in Al Bhed.   
  
Rikku just sighed, happily. "It's good to be back with family," she said, and wandered back inside.  
  
- End of Part One 


	2. Back In Besaid

**  
  
Part Two: Back in Besaid  
  
**  
  
The archways of the temple were rather soothing to Yuna's eye. There was something to their grace and flow that was pleasing to the eye and calming to the senses. They looked somewhat aerodynamic, fin-like, and brought to mind Valefor's elegance in the sky, and Yuna felt a pang of loss as she, for a moment, was painfully aware of the space in her mind where Valefor's fayth had once resided.  
  
It was something, she knew, that only a Summoner could understand. The Yevon clergy could go on all they liked about refusing to believe that the Fayth would abandon them, but any Summoner anywhere in Spira would feel that absence and know that the Fayth were gone without any hope of return. But still, Yuna had to see with her own eyes. It was a childish urge, she knew, but still, it was one she was willing to indulge just this once.  
  
No one stopped her as she strode through the entrance to the Temple, and she ignored the whispers as she ascended the steps to the Cloister of Trials. No one would dare think of stopping her, and so she pushed aside the doors carelessly, disappearing from view, and feeling a faint sense of relief at vanishing from the curious eyes of the Temple acolytes.  
  
She made her way through the Trials, remembering from past experience the sequence of orbs and slots that enabled her to make her way quickly to the Chamber of the Fayth. She moved through it automatically, barely giving a thought to anything other than her destination.  
  
The Chamber of the Fayth.  
  
The opened automatically at her approach, the mechanisms still working even if that which lay within was long gone. She paused at the threshold, hearing the door lower with a grinding noise behind her, she gave her eyes a moment to adapt to the dark, as the only light came from barely glowing sconces which dotted the walls every few meters. The chamber itself was practically unlit, as the light which used to be supplied from the fayth statue was gone.  
  
She rested a hand on the surface of the dome protecting the statue, expecting to feel the natural warmth she associated with it. Instead it was cool to the touch. Just like normal stone.  
  
"I wondered if I should take you and your kin back to Zanarkand," she said, her voice a low whisper. She felt disinclined to talk too loudly, realising she was standing in a tomb. There were very few tombs around Spira. It took too long to carve them out of unfeeling stone and rock. "I don't know if it's wise to keep you all in the Temples, where you were trapped for so long, if you shouldn't be returned home."  
  
She sat down on the floor, feeling a slight chill touching her backside as she did so. She wondered if it had been the best thing to do, coming straight here from the beach, having met and greeted what felt like every single person on Besaid island. Wakka had wanted to take her straight to the Healer, but she had put him off, insisting that she needed to see the Fayth.  
  
"But I have to wonder if you truly care," she continued, looking around her at nothing in particular. "If I were you, and had only now been able to sleep after a thousand years, I'd sleep wherever I happened to be, I think. And you, all of you, sleep on the Farplane."  
  
She sighed, absently running a hand over the cloudy glass that shielded the stone. "If you do, and the Al-Bhed are not wrong, of course." With her faith in Yevon having been shaken and tumbled, she couldn't help but question truths once held as absolute. Was the Farplane the home of those who were done with their lives on Spira, or simply a place where pyreflies gathered to give shape to the memories of the living?  
  
Yuna found that whenever she thought about it, she grew near tears. She drew such comfort in being able to visit her father and mother on the Farplane, and that it could have been false, only a mirror for her mind, shook her. She blinked rapidly, determined not to cry, not now, not here.  
  
She gripped the edge of her trailing sleeves, and stared to carefully clean away the dust that had started to threaten to obscure the statue beneath the dome. When the Fayth was in residence, it had kept itself clean, but now a thousand years worth of dust was settling. Yuna wasn't too bothered about dirtying her sleeve; it had become so filthy through blood and dirt on her pilgrimage that it was starting to get a little worn and threadbare anyway.  
  
"I wonder what I shall do," she said, as she cleaned. "I wonder how I shall live. I had expected to die, after all. I wasn't planning for a future." She paused, rubbing at a spot she'd already cleared. "What do other girls think about? Surviving long enough to marry? Have children?" She shook her head, taking a step around and continuing. "Maybe I should live. Just... live. That'd be nice. Not to anticipate death. Not to conduct the souls of the dead in a dance. Maybe I could get a dog."  
  
She paused, and muffled a laugh with her free hand. "Maybe not."  
  
She had dusted most of the dome clean, and she sat down again, giving the last few inches a sad swipe. "I wish I could be thinking about getting married. With /him/." She rested her arms on the dome, looking down into the empty stone. "I wonder if you had anyone you missed. Husband? Lover? Was he one of the Wall? Or did he die in Zanarkand long ago?"  
  
She'd never know.  
  
She thought perhaps about visiting the Farplane. Maybe if she saw the Fayth there, she would know that she had sent them and they were happy.  
  
But no. She couldn't doubt her abilities in the Sending. She had fulfilled her task. She should leave the dead to themselves, and just live her life as one of the living.  
  
She moved to her knees, bending down to press her lips against the dome in a brief kiss. "Rest well," she said, before getting to her feet and shaking some of the dust from her sleeves. "Goodbye."  
  
Yuna said, almost absently, to the Priest on her way out of the building, "Don't worry about resetting the Trials. There's nothing left to protect."  
  
**  
  
The village was practically thrumming with activity, even though it had shaded into evening by the time that Yuna emerged from the temple, and most of it seemed centred around the return of the High Summoner to live amongst them again. Many who she had known since childhood greeted her with apparently newfound respect and awe. She wasn't a simple apprentice any longer, but a High Summoner who had defeated Sin for all time and, not to mention, had lived. She smiled, nodded, and moved through the village that, while looked at her anew, seemed content to allow her to live her life. A few of the children tagged along, giggling and chattering to her enthusiastically.  
  
There were celebrations to take place that evening, she knew. A welcome home for the Summoner. She dutifully allowed herself to be pulled aside, to dance and talk with as many of the villagers could get close enough to her. There was a roaring fire in the village circle, with many people throwing open their huts and setting out food and drink within and allowing all free access.   
  
There was a palpable sense of relief in the air, Yuna thought. Not just joy, but relief, and this was how the villagers had chosen to express it. Their happiness wasn't all for Yuna's safe return, but for themselves, that they wouldn't have to see their village torn down and more children die. Yuna couldn't think of it as selfish, and threw herself into their celebrations, cheering on their new chance at life as much as they did.  
  
The elders of the village talked to her of the final battle with Sin over and over, and with some judicious editting of the real events, she told them until she felt her voice going hoarse and excused herself to find something to drink. On the way through the village, she passed Lulu and Wakka, both of who were being monopolised by villagers. Lulu kept batting away curious children who were trying to undo the buckles on her skirt out of simple curiosity, until Wakka gave them one of his blitzballs to play with and successfully distracted them. Kimahri was nowhere to be seen.  
  
She entered the hut she knew to belong to the village seamstress, who had put away her materials and covered her loom with a thick cloth and had set out trestle tables covered with some off-cuts of Besaid cloth and laiden them down with all manner of drink. Yuna selected a ceramic mug, filling it almost to the brim with a spicy mulled wine, and was focussing on blowing on the surface to cool it as she turned, walking straight into someone who had been paying as little attention as she had been.  
  
"Oh! Lady High Summoner! I'm so sorry!" The girl was small, pale haired and very young by the looks of her. She wouldn't look up into Yuna's face as she made the reverential prayer-sign of Yevon, bowing deeply and looking to stay bowed until Yuna, smiling, suggested she stand up properly to talk to her.  
  
"That's quite alright," she said, "I'm afraid I wasn't looking where I was going."  
  
The girl gave a nervous giggle, quickly muffled, and still refused to look up and meet Yuna's eyes.  
  
"What's your name?" Yuna asked the shy girl, gently.  
  
"Marta," the girl said, twisting her fingers together. "I came from Isalva village, from the other side of the island? Not long after you left on your pilgrimage."  
  
"Ah, I haven't had reason to visit there," Yuna said, sitting down and patting the couch next to her in invitation. "What made you come to Besaid village?"  
  
"The temple," Marta said, quietly, seeming as if she was about to refuse the offer of a seat before Yuna's kindly look encouraged her. "I... I heard you became a Summoner and went to confront Sin. I thought you were so brave, Lady High Summoner, I thought... that maybe I could do the same."  
  
Yuna felt a chill that travelled to the very tips of her fingers, and failed to be warmed by the hot mulled wine in the mug she held. "You became an apprentice Summoner?" she asked, making an effort to keep her voice light.  
  
"Yes," Marta bobbed her head, peeking up from behind blond hair that felt in front of her eyes, making eye contact for the first time. "I only received my first staff this week past and started to learn to dance the Sending." There was a proud gleam in her eyes that just hurt Yuna when she thought of what would have been in store for this girl at the end of her training. "Now, I don't have to go on a pilgrimage, but I just wanted you to know. You inspired me to help save Spira, and I wanted to thank you."  
  
Yuna gave the girl a one-armed hug about her shoulders before Marta slipped back into the party, leaving Yuna temporarily alone to stare despondantly into the surface of the wine before a new group entered the hut, reverencing to her, which she acknowledged with a smile and a nod, and walked out, deciding that she didn't want to face the party and the people there any longer, and without a better idea of where to go, Yuna returned to the hut she had always lived in with Kimahri since childhood.  
  
The little hut seemed practically untouched since she had left. The Ronso himself was already resting on his pallet in the main room, taking rest during the night as he had often not during the journey. He often elected to watch the camp at night, having better eyes during those dark hours than any of the Humans. The room was freshly aired out and swept, but other than that seemed untouched. The trunk that she had abandoned by the temple at the start of her journey was perched just inside the doorway of her bedroom.   
  
She knew exactly why the hut was untouched. It would have become a shrine to her. Had she fulfilled the expectations of Spira, defeated Sin and died in the process, the people of Besaid would have opened her hut as a shrine, inviting pilgrims of another sort to the village, who would praise Yevon that she had secured them another calm, and perhaps inspiring the next Summoner to their task, perpetuating the cycle of death.  
  
She sighed, not bothering to light the room, simply getting undressed and finding her bed by the starlight and by memory. She took a great deal of satisfaction in being finally able to divest herself of her clothing, grimy and worn from the travels and trials she had undergone with her Guardians, her friends, and not have to neatly fold them or wrap herself in blankets enough to keep her warm while crossing the ice fields of Macalania or the thin and treacherous paths of Mount Gagazet. She didn't bother to wash in the basin of water one of the women of the village had set out in anticipation of her return to the hut, but simply dropped herself, feeling weary to her soul, onto the bed, pulled the blanket over her, and fell instantly asleep.  
  
**  
  
The next morning, Yuna was faced with a dilemma. Part of the pilgrimage of a Summoner was a forced poverty. One change of clothes was all a Summoner could carry, with all the trials to go through, and so Yuna, when faced with the possibility of different clothes to wear, found that she couldn't possibly select something. She had experienced the unaccustomed luxury of going through several sets of clothing, trying them on and discarding, unable to decide what she wanted to wear. She found that she had lost a fair amount of weight while on her travels, and so some things were simply too big for her now, and she had hardly been large before she had left.  
  
Should she wear the blue or the green? Or neither? It seemed that simply to have the choice was an unimaginably pretentious, even though she knew, intellectually that it wasn't.  
  
There was a voice calling into the hut, hailing her by name, and Yuna was forced to make a decision, simply choosing to pull on the garment that was in her hands, a dress of green with yellow vines stitched upon it. She was attempting to wrangle the obi around her waist as she heard the almost silent padding of her Ronso friend crossing the floor in the main room to see who was apparently intent on waking anyone in the village who still slept.  
  
"Is the Summoner within?" she heard, echoing through the small hut.  
  
Thinking there was some emergency, Yuna hurried out of her room, still pulling her obi into a bow, and tugging it into position as she walked into sight of the door.  
  
"What is it? Is something wrong?" She had visions of her services needed to send the dead, not knowing why else they would need to see a Summoner, and wondered for a panicked moment what dreadful thing could have happened.  
  
"Oh! My lady High Summoner!" It was a couple, a man and woman, and it was the woman who spoke, referencing in the fashion of one who followed Yevon. "We're so glad to have seen you. We've come all the way from Kilika, you see."  
  
"What's wrong?" Yuna demanded, stepping closer to Kimahri, feeling the need of support. Simple being close to his immovable presence was a comfort.  
  
"Wrong?" The woman looked shocked. "Why, my lady, nothing is wrong! We simply had to come and see you with our own two eyes, to see the High Summoner who delivered us from Sin for all time."  
  
Yuna felt the worry drain out of her, leaving a faint annoyance in its place at having been so frantic. "Thank you," she said simply, reminding herself that this was to be expected from the people of Spira. All their past heroes were dead; she should be understanding of that. "It really wasn't necessary to inconvenience yourselves coming all this way."  
  
"But we had to, m'lady," The man this time. "Such a thing we can tell our child when he is born, that we saw the High Summoner who ensured he could grow up without fearing death."  
  
Yuna gave his wife a small bow. "Congratulations," she said.   
  
The woman raised a hand unconsciously to her stomach, brushing it fondly. "Thank you, my lady."  
  
Yuna abruptly realised that she was conducting this conversation on the doorstep of her home. "Would you like to come in?"  
  
The pair reacted like they'd been offered a chance to step into the Chamber of the Fayth, with a certain amount of shock. "M'lady, you do us a great honour!" the woman cried, as she tentatively crossed the threshold.  
  
Beside Yuna, Kimahri stirred. "Kimahri wait outside," he said succinctly, before he brushed past the woman's husband and into the fresh Besaid morning.   
  
Suppressing the wish to put these two off and follow him, Yuna smiled at her visitors and gestured to the table in the centre of the room. "Would you two like a cup of tea?"  
  
**  
  
The start to her day was more a sign of things to come. After Yuna had politely spent the morning listening to the couple who had visited her tell her what felt like their entire life stories, and they had departed, it was practically lunch time. She had been moving to the hanging curtains only to open them to reveal an older woman, faced lined and weathered, wearing a travelling over-coat and looking tired.  
  
"Ah, m'lady Yuna," she said, her expression lighting up, "Would you have a moment to spare for an old woman from Kilika who's come to pay her respects?"  
  
Yuna fought the urge to sigh, and beckoned the woman to enter. She never did wind up having anything to eat at lunch until Lulu entered, after the young man who had followed on from the old woman after she had finally departed, bearing a tray with some fruits and light snacks. "You don't have to see them all," the older mage had said then.  
  
Yuna smiled faintly around a mouthful of apple and shook her head. "In spite of what they have heard of Luca," she said, "Some will still not believe until they see me with their own eyes and talk to me, hearing the words as many have."  
  
Lulu raised a hand to her forehead, shaking her head slowly in a mirror of Yuna's gesture. "You shouldn't let them monopolise you so. You're allowed to have your own life."  
  
Yuna slowly lowered the sliced fruit from her lips. "Perhaps that is my task for now," she said, ponderously, only just coming to that conclusion herself. "To reassure the people of Spira that they have lives that they did not have before. That they can live without fear. My purpose in life has always been to save Spira. Perhaps I can help them realise..." She laughed slightly at how pretentious it sounded in her own mind, but said it anyway, "Perhaps I can help them realise that they have a chance to make Spira their own."  
  
And then a father and his son from the other side of Besaid Island arrived, and Lulu stepped out to give them some privacy.  
  
- End of Part Two 


	3. Eyes Like Firelight

**  
  
Part Three: Eyes Like Firelight  
  
**  
  
"Rikku, fyga ib. Wake up."  
  
The voice was accompanied by a hand gently stroking her face, stirring her from her sleep. Rikku muttered incoherently, swiping at the hand. "'Mup, Pops."  
  
"Sure ya are. You're not up til you're out of that bed and moving around."  
  
Rikku peeked an eye open, looking at her father, who was standing over the bed, really just a couple of cargo crates pushed together with a thin mattress stretched over the top and an equally threadbare blanket pulled over her shoulder. She had been sharing the room with the Al-Bhed Psychs, who had all apparently departed before she had awoken, to judge by the empty state of the room.  
  
She pushed the blanket away from herself, cautiously sitting upright and covering her sleepy eyes to protect them from the lights of the cargo bay. "See," she said, voice sleep-roughed. "Moving."  
  
Cid chuckled, moving away from her to give her some room to fall off the crates and stumble around looking for her belt pouches and accessories that she had removed the night before while he sat down on a nearby low crate. "Get a good night's sleep?"  
  
Rikku snorted indelicately as she crouched down next to some sort of mesh cage and fumbled around looking for her goggles. "I was sharing a room with a bunch of over-hyped blitzball players who think that if you stand still for a couple of minutes, you'll drop dead." She peered over the rim of the cage at her father. "I slept like a baby. I've had a very tiring few months."  
  
Cid made a sound of amusement and shook his head at her teasing tone of voice.   
  
Rikku continued talking, half to herself and half to her father, as she continued crawling around looking for odds and ends that had been misplaced during the night. "I was also dreaming of dinner. You know, a proper meal with fresh greens and not the rehydrated meals we have on board or the strips of dried meat and stew from the Pilgrimage."  
  
"I still can't believe you went on the Pilgrimage of all things. Idiot child."  
  
"Worked out, didn't it?"  
  
Having found all her items, and finished attaching them to her clothing, she stood, patting at her head. Her hair fell haphazardly about her face, having been dislodged in her sleep. She'd removed the clips and feathers for fear they would get damaged, and as a result, there was a distinct impression that a rat had attempted to nest in her hair. She immediately set about sorting it all out.  
  
It was then Rikku noticed that her father was staring at her. Rather self-consciously, she un-braided one of her plaits and began again, weaving the chocobo feather tighter into her hair. When he did not stop staring, she gave him a confrontational glance.  
  
"What?"  
  
Cid didn't back down. "You look a lot like your mother."  
  
Rikku didn't quite know what to say, as she quickly set to work re-braiding the other plait. She knew she looked a lot like her mother; many of the Al-Bhed said the same thing. Her mother had been a marvellous hydroponics engineer, making it possible for the Al-Bhed to survive in the harsh environment of the Sanubia desert. She had mastered cross-breeding various plant species to get maximum nutrition from them, and she had even devoted a part of her time to creating an oasis at the centre of the Al-Bhed Home, which had stood strong for many years and needed so little attention to blossom.  
  
Her mother's favourite time of year had been when the rains had come, she remembered, when the desert filled with life for a brief few hours.  
  
"I wish she could have lived to see this day."  
  
Rikku paused in resettling her clips. "I don't think she'd have wanted to see us try and rebuild our Home after it was destroyed and the people in it killed."  
  
"Like Keyakku?"  
  
She gave her father a dirty look and didn't say anything in response, just patting her head to make sure her hair was all in place before placing her goggles around her neck and folding her arms. "So how close to Bikanel are we?"  
  
"We arrived a few hours ago."  
  
Rikku stomped her foot, creating a hollow clanging noise on the deck plates. "And you didn't wake me?"  
  
Cid got to his feet, glaring down at her. "Were you that eager to see the remains of our Home again?"  
  
Rikku wilted somewhat. "No, but you shouldn't have tried to hide these things from me. I'm not a child."  
  
"No, you're not. And that's why I didn't wake you." When Rikku gave him a strange look, he turned away slightly. "You've been through more than I wanted any of my children to have to go through, even as hard lives as the Al-Bhed lead. Didn't think you had to go straight back into it."  
  
He started to leave the room, when Rikku spoke up with, "Thanks, Pops."  
  
Cid didn't pause but carried on straight out of the room, heading back towards the bridge.  
  
**  
  
The blackened and burnt bark splintered beneath her fingers as Rikku almost absent-mindedly pulled at the tree's rough exterior. It had been curiosity that had driven her to see how far the damage went beneath the surface, she was gratified to find that the interior was paler, green-white in colour, but she could see that it was starting to turn yellowish through lack of water. She was standing in the dip in the ground which had once been the artificial oasis which the Al-Bhed had placed in the center of their home, created by her mother, pulling at one of the palm trees which had surrounded it. But the water had been boiled away through the force of the explosion that had destroyed the great monument to Al-Bhed engineering skill. She had been surprised to find this burnt remnant of a tree trunk still standing, surrounded by a vista of twisted metal, and a sea of glass.  
  
Some things, it seemed, could survive anything. Rikku wished there was enough left to transplant and take it with them, but she knew that it wouldn't survive the next week, never mind a trip to another island.  
  
At least, she assumed they were moving to another island.  
  
Around her, Al-Bhed were picking through the rubble, many holding picks which they used to crack the inch of glass that had formed in the heat of the explosion to get at anything that might have survived underneath. Very little of anything that the salvage teams had found thus far was useful, though some of the metal they had collected was due to be melted down and recycled for usage in the new Home, wherever that would be.   
  
"Rikku!" The girl flinched as her brother's voice echoed across the space between them. He stood near the top of the cliff which dropped down into the crater where Home had stood. "Stop messing around with that tree and get on with your work!"  
  
Rikku waved her hand impatiently at him, ignoring him for the most part, but taking the point that her standing there contemplating the remnants of the tree wasn't exactly productive.  
  
She began kicking her way through the remnants of Home, brushing aside sand dunes and twisted metal with her boot, eyes scanning the ground for anything that might catch her eye. It might seem to the uneducated that she was simply wandering, but she was moving with a purpose that was hard to explain.  
  
Rikku made her discovery as she stepped into the shadow of an upright panel of metal, the edges melted and malformed, that had once formed one of the exterior walls. As she stepped out of the direct glare of the sun, a faint glimmer of light, no more than a candle being lit in the middle of the desert in brightness, caught her eyes. She crouched down, brushing at the sand that covered the imperfect glass, trying to get a better glimpse of whatever it was that glowed with its own light.  
  
She knelt, extracting a small hammer and chisel from her tool belt. She had been handed a mineralogical sample kit on disembarking from the ship, and as such had been tacitly assigned the task of sampling the ground materials from all around the area where Home had once stood, to see if it was possible to build there again. She set the chisel along a crack in the murky glass, and gave it a single firm tap with the hammer. The glass split, breaking off into a lump about the size of both of Rikku's fists pressed together.  
  
Levering it free of the sand underneath, she held it up to the light with one hand, turning it to see if her eyes had been correct in spying what they had. There were fire gems contained within. The most common way of finding said gems was in the wake of fiends who were predominantly fire based, often they were produced as a by-product of their unnatural existences. They contained fire, trapped within a solid exterior, and something as simple as throwing them could cause them to ignite. It had been heard of to find fire gems on the slopes of volcanoes, but no one had possessed of the time, or inclination, to go combing mountainous slopes for the tiny red gems. It seemed that the destruction of home had been trapped in the glass it had produced, forming these gems, suspended within.  
  
Rikku made a small "heh" sound, and got to her feet, putting away her tools and cradling the lump of glass in her hands. She would have to tell her father and the other teams, and tell them to keep alert for any other gems beneath the surface of the desert. The little crystals were very useful, and if they came out with a small stash, it wouldn't go unappreciated by Cid.  
  
There was something that caught her attention, though.  
  
The glass was getting warmer.  
  
With a yelp, Rikku threw the stone away from herself as the sunlight focussed through the mostly transparent material heated up the gems to the point where one or two closest to the surface spontaneously combusted, exploding with a flash of light and a shattering of the glass about them. Fire gems found in the ashes of volcanoes or explosions were potent, but notoriously more unstable than those exuded by fiends.  
  
She patted her face and arms, checking that none of the flying shards had cut her. Satisfied she was fine, she bent down to pick up her find again, making a careful note to keep it out of direct sunlight.  
  
Rikku bent down to pick up the chunk and froze, eyes alighting on something, some anomaly beneath the surface. It wasn't the same as the fire gems, there was no inner light to be seen. It was something darker, and Rikku had the distinct feeling she shouldn't be looking closer.   
  
Nevertheless, the pulled on her goggles, the ones she'd had specially adapted to examine fine machina, and crouched down, squinting at through the murkiness to try and discern what had caught her eye. Her scream upon realising what it was brought several of her compatriots running towards her, fearing for her, in time to see her scrabbling away backwards, still crouched on the ground, from the darkened spot in the sand.  
  
Beneath the surface was a body, mostly charred and burnt away to ashes, but still recognisably holding up a hand, as if trying to claw for the surface.  
  
**  
  
In spite of Cid's reassurances that everyone who had still be alive when Home fell had made it out on the airship (excluding, of course, the attackers that had descended upon them), Rikku refused to be comforted, and wouldn't respond to the entreaties of anyone to speak for the rest of the day. She had returned to the airship with the fire gems she had collected, as well as any others that people brought to her. At the end of her day's labour, she had a cache of softly glowing warm gems ready for use, along with an untouched plate of food that Rin had brought here somewhere around the middle of the afternoon. She slipped some of the gems into her leg pouch for her own use, before storing the rest carefully in a reinforced box.  
  
"Rikku?" Rin again, and he was looking disapprovingly at the still full plate left beside her. She pointedly ignored the look, instead returning a questioning gaze. He gave her a slight, sad smile. "Come on, it's time."  
  
Rikku's fingers contracted around the fire gems she had been locking away, quickly finishing her task, before she joined the others on deck for the service to commemorate all those who had died in defence of their Home.  
  
**  
  
The service was over, and the Al-Bhed that had assembled on the open deck of the airship were, to a man (or woman), dirty, tired and most were sitting on the deck looking numb. Picking through the remains of your home would do that for you. Most of the salvaged components were stowed safely belowdecks, bodies had been properly interred, and everyone simply looked as if they wanted to sleep for a year or two.  
  
But Cid was having none of it, pacing in front of the Al-Bhed as he spoke, forcing all eyes to him.  
  
"We're not going to be rebuilding on Bikanel," Cid said, looking at everyone in turn, his gruff voice not inviting argument. "It's too dangerous."  
  
Rikku, who had been resting her head on the shoulder of Keeya, a young female medic whose task it had been to prepare the bodies for death and who was sitting next to her, felt as if she should speak out against her father, and say that the days of Yevon terrorising them were gone, that Sin was gone, and that everything was going to be alright.  
  
But a part of herself knew that was only a childish dream. Maybe it was just the fact that she, like all other Al-Bhed, had spent her life being hated, feared and despised, for her knowledge and skills and for the fact that they did not worship as others did. She knew the darker side of Spira's nature, and the Al-Bhed had often been on the receiving end of it, and so all of them had a very hard time believing whole-heartedly, as Yuna did, that an age of peace and prosperity had dawned.  
  
Cid continued pacing as he spoke, and an observer might have found it comical how most of the Al-Bhed heads watching followed him from side to side. "Sin might be dead, and Yevon might be dying, but too many people hate the Al-Bhed for being Al-Bhed, and they know Bikanel now. They came and destroyed our Home, and we will not let them have that opportunity again. Some of us have chosen to settle in Luca, the Djose region, and other places besides. But there will always be a place in Spira that Al-Bhed can call Home."  
  
The Al-Bhed nodded silently in agreement.  
  
Cid paused, looking out over the ruins of Home, the deep pit where it had once stood, and around which the airship drifted lazily, searchlights crossing over the wreckage. The illumination leeched all the colour from the ruins, giving it a silvern quality, and cast long shadows that moved with the motion of the craft. It looked ethereal and untouchable, and Rikku was faintly glad that it looked like that, rather than the bodies were all in the open on display.  
  
"We'll continue the salvage tomorrow morning," said Cid, "And finish as soon as we can. Then we begin a search for a new place to call Home."  
  
**  
  
Kimahri had taken to standing outside the door of the hut, Yuna knew, and she also knew that was also the reasoning why the number of visitors she had been receiving had suddenly curtailed in the last day or so. Which was why she was able to sit on the low couch near Kimahri's bed, by the table, quietly drinking tea which she vaguely remembered one of her temple instructors swearing was supposed to be soothing to the mind and body. Yuna couldn't say she'd noticed any such effects taking hold.  
  
She was determined to leave the hut today, though, and head out into the village proper. She refused to let Lulu and Wakka get all her food for her, saying that she was neither an invalid nor incapable of living for herself. Still, the pair insisted on meeting she and Kimahri on the outskirts of the main square, where there were stalls laid out for the market that day, and people from throughout the village milled around, perusing the various wares.  
  
Yuna's first stop was to the weaponsmith, on the very outskirts. She had made Kimahri help her in carrying her old weapons and armour to sell. She was hardly poor and in need of the gil, but she was determinedly telling herself that she no longer required them, and so off-loaded them quickly to the woman who clucked over their obvious overusage.  
  
Yuna hadn't sold everything. She hadn't been able to bring herself to do that.  
  
So, that task done, she set about moving throughout the market with her little entourage. It was different, she knew, than when she had been journeying. There, whenever they had moved into a populated area, her Guardians had been tense, expectant of an attack. Here, it was more like friends going for a stroll, which was just as it should be. No one should have to fear an attack in their own village.  
  
She had progressed halfway through the market, and was in conversation with the fishmonger about how hard it was to find decent yellowback shoals in the waters near Besaid when she heard the shouting.  
  
"Lady Yuna! My lady!"  
  
Yuna turned automatically at the call of her name, and her Guardians automatically shifted in what she recognised from long familiarity as readying for anything that might threaten her. She supposed she shouldn't chide them for their ingrained habits of being ready for an attack. That morning, she had awoken, and in her half asleep state, had flung on the first clothes to hand, reaching about for her staff and her armour before she had even realised she was preparing herself to face a day of battles. Would she, she wondered, ever get used to the idea that she did not have to fight, and that her life would not end in violence now?  
  
Possibly not. She could try, which was why she had divested herself of most of her armaments earlier that day.  
  
But the one who was calling her name did not appear to be much of a threat. He was a young man, not even Yuna's age, and his feet and clothes were stained from the dirt of the road. He had a slightly officious bearing about him, and that combined with the official sigil he bore on his chest as well as his state of dress, tipped her off about who it was she was talking to.  
  
He was a messenger, and by the look of the emblem he bore, he came from one of the companies who spanned Spira. A chain of stores that sold weapons if she recalled correctly, having had reasons to patronise several of those establishments in the last few months. Yuna had heard that the family behind the shops was fairly wealthy, weapons always being in requirement for all walks of Spiran life. Pacificists, after all, did not last long against fiends.  
  
"Yes?" she peered out from around Wakka's bulk, since he had moved in front of her to protect her from harm. "Can I help you?"  
  
The messenger gave a curt salute, before barrelling ahead with his message.  
  
"Master Liberam, owner of weapons shops throughout Spira, offers what he hope is a most enticing proposal to the Lady High Summoner Yuna. His son, Chandar, is of equal age to the Lady High Summoner, and will one day in the future inherit his father's empire of weapons shops and smithies. He believes that an..." And here the messenger stumbled over the words slightly. "... alliance between the two of you would be appreciated not only by both families."  
  
Yuna couldn't help but wonder whether she should point out that her only surviving family was Al-Bhed, but decided against it.  
  
"And so, Master Liberam wishes you to know of his son's eagerness to meet you, my Lady High Summoner, with the future possibilities of a permanent bond between the two of you."  
  
"He's proposing marriage?" That was Lulu, apparently in shock.  
  
The black mage stifled something between a gasp and a giggle, while Wakka cleared his throat awkwardly and looked embarrassed. Kimahri was impassive as always. Yuna felt her mouth kink into a smile, and she tried to think of a way to best phrase the sentence 'not a chance' in a manner that would be diplomatic and tactful.   
  
She was saved, however, from answering by the timely cackling of the old woman at the fish stall that Yuna was standing at. The messenger's confused eyes flicked to the old woman and back to Yuna, before he looked closer at the fish seller.   
  
The old woman shook her head, still chuckling, "Ah, young man, obviously your master has not been paying attention to the world," she chided. "For all of Spira knows that the Lady High Summoner is already wed! To the Lord Maester Seymour! Though the words say that he rests in peace on the Farplane, surely you do not expect a bride to forget her husband so soon."  
  
Yuna had to turn away to prevent herself from choking on the sentiment the woman's words evoked. She had to wonder if a marriage counted if you only went along with it to kill the groom.  
  
The messenger seemed distraught, wringing his hands together. "Lady Yuna, is this true?"  
  
Yuna turned back, pasting a solemn expression on her features. "Alas, it is so." It wasn't a lie. She had progressed through the entirety of the wedding ceremony, albeit reluctantly, before she had thrown herself off the tower. She thought that had very eloquently expressed her feelings on the matter. But if this truth in which she herself did not believe conveniently solved her problem, then she had no problem in wielding the information judiciously. "Please convey my apologies to your master, but I cannot accept his proposal."  
  
"Oh," The messenger was wringing his hands again. "Oh dear, oh dear. Thank you for your time, Lady Yuna. Oh dearie me." And he shuffled off, looking somewhat nervous and dejected.  
  
Yuna felt slightly sorry for him having to deliver such news to his master, which would obviously not been the answer that Liberam was hoping for.  
  
"Heh," Wakka nudged her with an elbow. "Never thought I'd see the day when you'd claim marriage to that Seymour."  
  
"Neither did I," Yuna said, with a slight smile, accepting the parcel of seafood that the fishmonger had finished preparing, placing it on top of the fruits in her basket. She examined the products of her hard days labour of shopping and hefted the basket in her hands. "Come back to my home this evening," she offered to her friends, "You have all spent so long seeing to my needs that I want to return the favour."  
  
They were halfway through the evening meal when yet another visitor had come calling. But this one, Yuna found, was a little more welcome than the others.  
  
**  
  
The scholar Maechen had become a familiar face to Yuna and her Guardians on their travels. He had told stories of the history of their locales when anyone had wanted to listen, and their newcomer from a different Zanarkand had never heard any of them before, and so always asked to hear them in full. They had all become accustomed to listening to his stories, passing time sitting by the trail during a break as he sat by the fire and spoke until he had no more information to give.  
  
Maechen had accepted a plate at her table, and was telling them, in his stenatorian tones, what had happened since they had last parted ways on Mount Gagazet. He told them of seeing the lights that had signified the destruction of Sin reaching even Besaid Island. He had apparently briefly mourned Yuna's passing, before he had heard that she was still alive and travelling with the Al-Bhed. He told of how it had gladdened the hearts of so many to hear that, and that the unusual matter of her survival had done much to encourage the idea that Sin was gone forever now.  
  
He had started to travel to Luca, but hadn't arrived there in time to hear her speech, apparently, though he had invested in a sphere copy. He said that one day he would write the story of her Pilgrimage and the final defeat of Sin. He asked that she tell him her story, so that he would know, and be able to record the story for generations to come after.  
  
Yuna had already spent so much time in the last few days telling people of the final battle against Sin; dry facts, revealing little of the more personal aspects of the destruction of the great evil that had plagued Spira for a thousand years. But now she felt compelled to tell the whole story. Maechen was not a man who wanted to hear tales of how the heroes won the battle, how they fought bravely and destroyed evil and lived happily ever after. He wanted to know what happened simply for knowing's sake. It was a selfless sort of seeking which Yuna appreciated: the fact that he wanted to know not only for the sake of himself but for others betterment as well.  
  
So she began to tell him everything. She started at the point where she had first learned that her father had died, in the process becoming a High Summoner. She told him of her meetings of her Guardians, including, and she was distressed to realise with a quaver in her voice, the blond Guardian who had appeared from another Zanarkand. She told the story from beginning to end, with the three who had travelled with her staying silent for the most part, only clarifying a few points here and there. Lulu held her hand through a good portion of the telling, and Yuna drew strength from that. Her voice became hoarse repeatedly, and by the end she thought she had nearly lost it.  
  
Maechen, it seemed, was not unaffected. At her recounting of her final greatest Sending, he had raised his napkin to his eyes and dapped at them delicately. "Oh, my Lady High Summoner Yuna," he said, giving her the full title accorded to her. "Such a tale. Greater than many the balladers weave, I wager. And told with such humility. You may not feel yourself worthy of the honour that others would heap upon you, but you are. And so are your Guardians, for they are as much a part of your story as you."  
  
Lulu gave her hand a squeeze, and Yuna smiled at the man, feeling somewhat better for having told the entire story to someone who wanted to hear it, and didn't think any the less of her for being imperfect, for wavering in the darker moments or realising that Yevon was corrupt and had lost its way.  
  
"I think I need a drink," she said, releasing her friend's hand and moving to get a fresh jug of water.  
  
Yuna got to her feet, and felt more than saw an instant dimming of her vision around her edges. She blindly thrust out a hand and fortunately grabbed onto the back of the chair she had been sitting at. She swayed on her feet, but before she had toppled over completely, she realised Kimahri had sprung up with his innate swiftness and caught her, cradling her gently in massive paws that could crush her easily. Perhaps that was what she had always loved about him. He was so gentle with her, even though he could be otherwise.  
  
"Lady Yuna!" It was Maechen, and he had taken one of her hands, anxiously patting the back of it. "Are you unwell, Lady?"  
  
Yuna tried to sound dismissive, "Oh, I'm sure I'm well, my dear scholar. I just seem to be rather tired at the moment. Perhaps simply the strain of retelling the story of my pilgrimage."  
  
"Nu-uh." Wakka waved his hand in a cutting motion. "No way I'm going to believe that, ya? Not after you were ill on the beach."  
  
"Yuna! You've already been ill?" Lulu this time, and Yuna wished she could reassure them all that she was fine, but they were all determined to believe otherwise it seemed. "You must go to the temple and seek a healer's aid!"  
  
"I will not go to the temple," Yuna said, stubbornness lacing her voice.  
  
"Then I will fetch a healer directly," Lulu said firmly, and before Yuna could offer up any further objections, she had stood up from her seat and strode from the room.  
  
Yuna sighed, resting her head back against Kimahri, devoutly wishing that she did not having the feeling she would be revisiting her dinner very shortly.  
  
- End of Part Three 


	4. The Burden of Knowledge and Foresight

**  
  
Part Four: The Burden of Knowledge and Foresight  
  
**  
  
Lulu had long ago realise that fretting while waiting for a piece of news was unproductive, and a waste of everyone's time and effort, so as she waited, along with Wakka and Kimahri (the scholar Maechen had apologised profusely, but he had an appointment to meet in Isalva village early the next morning and had quickly left), in the main room of Yuna's home for the verdict of the Healer, and as she did so, she conjured water to refresh the jugs and the basin about the hut and cleared away the plates that had been abandoned by the group from the table.  
  
Wakka, it seemed, was not nearly so sanguine.  
  
"What's wrong with her?" He muttered, pacing back and forth. Kimahri's tail was flicking back and forth in time to to the blitzer's movements. "Maybe it was something she ate. Those Al-Bhed rations tasted mighty strange, I tell ya!"  
  
Lulu patiently stowed the now clean plates and glasses in cupboards as she said, "Yuna did not partake of the Al-Bhed food before we arrived on Besaid."  
  
Wakka stopped, staring at her. "Maybe that's the problem. Maybe she hasn't been eating properly. Ooooh... I should have been watching more carefully."  
  
"Or," It was Kimahri this time. "Yuna only tired."  
  
"Exactly," agreed Lulu, glancing towards the curtain which separated the rooms. Unfortunately, any words being exchanged between Yuna and the healer Lulu had summoned from her temple rooms in the dead of night were too soft and too effectively muffled to be overheard. And Lulu had spotted Kimahri's ears twitching, and recognised the look of frustration on his face as he failed to hear anything. "And more to the point, we don't know what could be wrong with Yuna. Which is why there is a healer seeing to her as we speak. Calm yourself, Wakka, there'll be answers soon."  
  
Wakka's answer was something along the lines of not being willing to wait too long, but it was low spoken enough for Lulu to ignore. She could speak all she liked about the value of waiting, but a deep gnawing disquiet ate away at her insides. Yuna had never been a sickly child, the usual childhood sniffles not withstanding, and to have the need to summon a healer to see to her was more than a worry to her. Lulu did not have a reputation for being calm and collected for nothing, however, and she allowed little of her fear to be shown. She was sure that Wakka and Kimahri, having known her so long, had a clue, but she prided herself on her composure.  
  
What could it be? The loss of her aeons? No Summoner had had their bonds cut by anything other than their own death. Lulu did not claim to understand what happened between Summoner and Fayth, but she had gathered that there was a connection on a deep, unseen and untouchable level.  
  
Or perhaps it was the effect of being within Sin, some essence of the foul creature having poisoned her body. True, all of the Guardians had been right beside her and none showed any similar symptoms (at least, Lulu presumed so, three of their party being unable to offer knowledge of their status), and so it was hard to believe that, though it was plausible.  
  
Her thoughts led Lulu to one inescapable conclusion: that she had no idea what could be wrong with the girl she looked upon as a sister.  
  
Lulu saw Kimahri's twitching before she saw the healer push back the curtain, stepping outside and resettling her sleeves.  
  
"How is she?" Lulu took the lead in the questioning, stepping forward into the path of the healer so that the woman could not leave without first answering.  
  
The healer wrinkled her nose, but spoke anyway. "The High Summoner is suffering from a transitory condition," she said, carefully. "It will pass."  
  
The three waited to hear anything more, but the healer seemed more interesting in smoothing out the wrinkles in her gown. "Is that all?" Wakka finally demanded, glaring at the woman, using the fact that he was a good deal taller than her to his advantage.  
  
The healer looked back up at them, biting her lip in the face of the overprotective vibrations coming from each of the three former Guardians. "The Lady High Summoner's collapse was due to her overstretching herself. She has not had enough rest recently, nor as she been partaking of the right foods. I understand before she returned to Besaid that she was subsisting on trail rations for weeks, why it's hardly a wonder she felt faint." The healer snapped her case shut. "It's a wonder she didn't collapse sooner."  
  
"Is there anything we can do to help?" Lulu asked, making sure that Wakka couldn't get an 'I told you she wasn't eating properly' in edgeways.  
  
The healer shrugged. "It seems from the remains of your meal that she's eating appropriately again. Keep that up, and there shouldn't be a reoccurence."  
  
As the healer finished gathering her things and departing from the hut, Yuna appeared in the doorway of her room, a wan smile on her face. "I am well," she assured them, smiling at Wakka as he rushed up to make sure himself that she was still in one piece. "I have lived through far worse and doubtless will again in the future."  
  
"You were fighting fiends and monsters," Lulu said, implacably. "You were not having dinner with friends."  
  
"Lulu, Wakka," Yuna said kindly, "I am well. The healer said I have only been overextending myself."  
  
Kimahri's tail swished through the air. A tacit 'told you so' gesture which Wakka gave the Ronso a half-hearted glare for.  
  
"I'm going to go to bed and rest," said Yuna, shooing them out of the hut, "I'm sure I'll feel well tomorrow."  
  
**  
  
Yuna felt, true to the her words, much better the next morning. The good night's sleep had done her wonders, and it had gotten around the village that she was unwell and not up to receiving guests, and so many of the villagers had been subtly redirecting would-be-visitors away from her hut. Lulu and Wakka had checked in on her, but were reassured by the healthy blush to her features, and didn't bother her when she expressed a simple desire to get some rest.  
  
Kimahri was sitting in their living area, a pot of tea and an empty mug set out on the table for her. Kimahri never drank tea, and the fact that he had gone to effort of making something that she loved gave Yuna cause to worry. He only ever did such things when he wanted to share something unpleasant with her.   
  
Her mind flashed back to the expression on Rikku's face when her cousin had cornered her on the airship's deck, and though a Ronso's expressions were nothing like those of the Al-Bhed, Yuna had spent too long around her friend not to be intimately familiar with what every twitch of his fur meant.  
  
"You want to leave, don't you?"  
  
Kimahri lowered his head slightly, as close as he would come to a nod.  
  
Yuna moved automatically, picking up the mug he had set out for her, pouring some tea and taking a sip without even thinking about it. She couldn't stop him; it wasn't her right to do so. It was selfish, she knew, but she wanted to keep him with her. She wanted to throw her arms around his chest and plead with him not to leave as she had done so long ago when he had first brought her to Besaid.  
  
But she was a grown woman now. It was time to think of what he wanted, not her own needs.  
  
"Why?" she asked, striving to sound simply curious, and not hurt, though she was sure her voice wavered slightly.  
  
"To find those taken by Seymour," he said, his voice somewhat lower and more gravelly than usual. "And for Ronso to claim them back from the mountain."  
  
Yuna knew what he meant. He wanted to meet up with the other Ronso left alive after Seymour's rampage through Mount Gagazet, to find the bodies of those who he had slain, to know who they were and to give them over to a more honourable burial than being lost in the ice fields and craggy rocks. "If you need a Summoner," she said, looking at his deep amber eyes, "Someone to perform a Sending, I am here. It would mean a lot to be able to do that for the people who stood by me when no one else did."  
  
Though it was spoken among Spirans that fiends were the dead who had been killed by Sin, Yuna had learnt from her tutors that it was rather a case of those who had died 'unwillingly'. And that was a far more difficult to define cause of one's demise. It might have been those who died fighting, who were murdered, or even those who had suffered accidents and could not accept their own deaths, lingering on. She could not bear the thought that those brave, proud Ronso who had proclaimed they would build a statue of her with a great horn, when all others only wanted her dead as a traitor, would wander Spira as fiends and monsters.  
  
Kimahri put a hand on top of her head in affection, and Yuna didn't bother fixing her hair after he removed it. It made her feel loved.  
  
"Are you going to contact the Al-Bhed and seek transport?" Yuna asked, striving to keep her smile fixed on her face.  
  
Kimahri shook his head. "Al-Bhed have their own home to worry about. Kimarhi make own way to Gagazet." He settled one of his great paws on top of her fingers, which she had tightly woven together. "Kimahri worries for Yuna."  
  
"Don't worry," Yuna said, with a soft laugh that she hoped sounded carefree. "Between Wakka and Lulu, I don't think I'll have any problems scaring away any adoring fans."  
  
"Yuna not need Wakka or Lulu."  
  
Yuna grinned, a little more genuinely this time. "You're sweet, Kimahri."  
  
She wanted to be like him. Not blue furred and large in size, but to have the freedom to travel, to go where she wished. But that was not her fate, at least not for now. Perhaps at some point in the future it would be, but now she was confined to a simple wooden hut on one of Spira's southernmost islands.  
  
"Take my battle items and any armour you wish," Yuna offered, "I would have the knowledge that I have helped you protect yourself on the road, in lieu of not being there by your side."  
  
"Kimahri will miss Yuna."  
  
Yuna swallowed past the lump in her throat. "Will you leave today?" she asked, and he nodded.  
  
"Boat leaves for Kilika after midday meal. Kimahri will be on board."  
  
Impulsively, Yuna scrambled to her feet and threw her arms around him, clinging to him tightly and burying her face in his fur. His large, so strong arms wrapped around her gently. Those arms were capable of crushing her, and Yuna remembered when she was little several of the village women expressing concern that the child of the High Summoner was being cared for by such a strong creature, but his embrace had only made her feel safe, and comforted, like nothing could ever come between them. Yuna revelled in the feeling that she was a small girl again, where her friend and protector's embrace could make all the monsters go away.  
  
Later, after he had left, Yuna sat alone at her table, a cup of fragrant herbal tea in her hands, the surface of the drink gently rippling as her tears splashed down from her face into the cup. With the newfound silence in the hut, and the burden of knowledge which the healer had suddenly placed upon her, Yuna felt horribly, terribly, alone.  
  
**  
  
High Priestess Ismene looked out over the city below. Standing, as she was, at the top of the tower of the temple of St. Bevelle, she had a perfect overview of everything that happened below. The breeze was calm that day, and barely raised her hair with its motion. Bevelle had only recently reopened its gates, but she, and the rest of the Yevon clergy, still realised that something had changed.  
  
The people no longer flocked to Yevon's heart.  
  
Most of those who had moved back into the city were residents there, who had left when the warrior monks had started patrolling the streets and, in their fear, cracking down on all sorts of freedoms within the city walls. There were a few who came to worship had the temples, but there were so few. Where before they would have been full, now they barely filled a quarter of their seats.  
  
Some within Yevon refused to panic, or see a problem. Traditionally, in the aftermath of Sin's defeat, there had been a period where faith in Yevon would fall off, where the people would think they no longer needed the protection of the church. After all, Sin was defeated, what was there to be concerned about? When Sin returned, those clergymen argued, the people realised their folly, and Spira would return to them.  
  
Ismene, and others, were not so convinced. She had walked through the Trials. She knew them intimately and had no problem negotiating them. As an acolyte, she had been assigned to reset the Trials after a Summoner had passed through them. It had been a role that had marked her out from the mass of Yevonites who served the church early on. Entering and passing through the Trials was something only permitted to a Summoner and their Guardians, and coming so close to the Fayth was a sure sign she was made for great things.  
  
She thought becoming one of the heads of Yevon church raised her to that standard.  
  
She had passed through the Trials, and then, not without a degree of trepidation, she had passed through the door to the Chamber of the Fayth, and had stood over the statue. She had heard tales of the statue, and knew that it was not meant to look like dead and lifeless stone. The room had been cold, and her breath had misted in the air. She had wanted to cry then, because she knew that they had been abandoned by the Fayth, and she was not the first to come to that conclusion.  
  
Other priests and priestesses had followed, risking being labelled as blasphemers for their actions, and seen the statues, all across Spira, for themselves. The Fayth were gone. And everyone knew far too well that Sin was more likely to return than not. In the past, everyone had declared that Sin was gone forever, and every time it returned.  
  
Granted, the High Summoners themselves had never been present to make that statement, but it was hard to ignore a thousand years of precident.  
  
Ismene, though, felt that she had a wider view of matters than the rest of the church. She had seen the statues, seen the dead Fayth, and had felt, in her bones, that perhaps High Summoner Yuna was right. Sin would not return. In which case, the 'brief drop in attendance' to the worship of Yevon would become permanent when it was realised that death incarnate would not come back to haunt them.  
  
That was not going to happen, not while Ismene still had breath in her body. Not while she could still affect the course of Yevon. The younger priests and priestesses were easily led, the old men who thought themselves powerful were fools and easily pushed to courses of action while still thinking it was their plan. And the head of the warrior monks who had recenting been appointed was about as suited to his task as the daft white mage who had somehow been appointed as Captain of the Guard.  
  
She felt the wind raise, as if sensing her thoughts. She clenched her hands, feeling just how bony her fingers were, and realised that she was too old now to give up on that which she had devoted her life to.  
  
"I will not Yevon die! I swear it!" She called to the wind. "I will not let that which I have believed in my whole life and suffered for be dismissed as inconvenient!"  
  
Almost as an echo, the bells of St. Bevelle chimed out the hour, and Ismene raised her hands, feeling as if she could take on anything, anyone, even the High Summoner who proclaimed Yevon to be a lie.  
  
- End of Part Four 


	5. Temporal Convergence of Hypnogogic Regre...

**  
  
Part Five: Temporal Convergence of Hypnogogic Regressions  
  
**  
  
The stink of discharged machina weaponry, weaponry that which Yuna had been raised to abhor, and made her want to choke on more than the smell, had filled the air. It was like some sort of burning mineral, sulphur, she thought, as was used to create matches. She had been sitting exhausted atop a low rock, burdened with the knowledge that, as a Summoner, she would be required to send the souls that lay within the mangled corpses littering the beach. They hadn't asked her to come yet, but she knew it was only a matter of time until they had straightened out the bodies, and cleared a path she could walk through.  
  
So she sat, nursing her wounds, and staring over at the figure who stood at the very edge of the cliff, watching over the progress of the walking wounded as they tended to their comrades. What would the repercussions be for Seymour, she wondered. Would he be called to task by the other Maesters for supporting this action against Sin that had cost so many lives, for condoning an alliance with the Al-Bhed? What of Kinoc?  
  
She could not say what lay within the minds of the Maesters, for she was not privy to such things.   
  
As Lulu tightened the bandage around Yuna's leg, causing her to glance down, one of several spots in which Yuna had been injured by flying stone shards that had been thrown at her with the thrashings around of the great fiend that she, Auron and Seymour had destroyed. There were no healing potions or medicines to be found, Yuna having insisted that the mostly uninjured party give them to help those who lay on the beach, and she was too exhausted to heal herself with magic.  
  
The Mushroom Rock Road, she had thought, was fascinating. The peculiar rock formations had caused her no end of interest as they had crossed paths and climbed to the tops of precipices, and in some part of her mind, she lamented the lack of education she had in what caused these rocks to shape this way. Thoughts of erosion and of vicious storms had crossed her mind.  
  
Now whenever she thought of this Road, she would only see Sin, and see the death.  
  
It only strengthened her resolve. Seymour had said she was not strong enough. She would become strong enough. She would become as strong as her father.  
  
Lulu got to her feet to go and see to Wakka, who had apparently inhaled a mouthful of water (how he had done this was beyond Yuna) and was apparently not feeling very well in the aftermath. It left Yuna alone, and she stood, crossing over to the blue-haired man who watched the macabre scene on the beach below.  
  
He looked at her as she approached, and his eyes flickered to her leg. He seemed somewhat tired himself; she knew he had been helping to mop up a few fiends left behind in Sin's wake, and he had been overexerting himself slightly, it seemed. He raised his hand.  
  
She closed her eyes as a deliciously warm sensation swept over her. It was one she only usually encountered in the heat of battle, when she was too unnerved by the excitement in her veins to notice such things. The wash of blue-white light that rippled under her skin, and the smell of freshly cut grass invaded her senses.  
  
"I did not need you to do that," she said, opening her eyes to look at Seymour, who had lowered his hand after casting the curative spell upon her. "There are others more in need of help than I."  
  
"I disagree," Seymour said smoothly, and had said nothing further on the subject.  
  
**  
  
Lulu, after learning of Kimahri's intent to depart, and seeing him off with both Wakka and Yuna at the pier, had been making regular visits to Yuna's hut. The young woman had been refusing most company, and she would have been refusing to eat as well, had Lulu not been making a nuisance of herself, forcing her to eat and sitting in the hut so that there was at least someone else there to talk to.   
  
Yuna had not availed herself of the offer, preferring to sequester herself within her room, apparently deep in thought. Lulu's only comfort was that there did not seem to be any recurrence of the strange tiredness that had plagued her. This had been the state of affairs now for several days.  
  
Wakka, he had said, didn't know what to do for her. "She's a girl, Lu," he had told her. "She's my friend and like a little sister to me, ya? But I still don' know what to say, apart from what I said at the beach."  
  
He had said he was there for her, that he'd miss Kimahri too, and that the blitzball team wanted to throw her a little party to cheer her up, so she should be ready for some terrible cooking. It had made Yuna smile for a moment, but it had faded quickly. She had shuffled back to the village looking despondent.  
  
It was so totally out of character for Yuna that it made Lulu more than a little afraid. Not even when she thought she would give her life for Spira had Yuna been so sad. Lulu paused in tidying up the little kitchen of Yuna's, and now Yuna's alone, hut. Could it be the opposite, she wondered? Could living be what made Yuna so miserable?  
  
She felt cold, and she nearly dropped the plate she held. A Summoner expected death. That was their goal. It was what they travelled for months to accomplish. Could it be...? Could it be that a Summoner desired death in some way? Could the prospect of living be so terrible?  
  
Lulu shook her head sharply, saying "No!" aloud to convince herself of it. Yuna wasn't that sort of person, the sort to give up on something, especially not life. Lulu refused to believe it, and she would never let Yuna do such a thing anyway. Not now. Not when she didn't have to.  
  
"Lulu? Who's there?"  
  
Embarrassed, Lulu turned to face Yuna, who had poked her head out from behind the curtain. From the way Yuna's hair was mussed, she guessed that the younger woman had been sleeping when she had heard Lulu's utterance. "I'm sorry," she said, "I didn't mean to disturb you."  
  
"No, that's alright." Yuna stepped out from her room, still clad in a sleeping shift. It was well into mid-morning, but Yuna had apparently not awoken until Lulu had become loud. One more reason for Lulu to worry about her. "Strange dreams."  
  
"Nightmares?" Lulu asked, striving for an unconcerned tone as she finished stacking plates.  
  
"Memories," Yuna said, flattening her mouth before sitting down at the table, sighing as Lulu moved to make her tea and something to eat. "I'm not a child."  
  
Lulu nodded as she poured water from a jug into the kettle. "Of course you're not," she said, plucking two mugs from a shelf, demonstrating her intention to share the tea with Yuna. Faced with this, Yuna relented, picking at the sleeve of her nightgown. Lulu bustled about in silence for a moment, settling plates and little fresh pastries on the table, as well as the mugs.  
  
"Would you like honey?" Lulu asked solicitously, glancing over her shoulder at Yuna.  
  
"No," Yuna said quietly.  
  
Lulu blinked. "Oh, I'm sorry. I thought you liked it."  
  
"I do. The healer said I shouldn't eat it."  
  
Lulu blinked once more, feeling somewhat akin to an owl. "I see," she said neutrally, setting the teapot down on the table and pulling out a chair without another word, while Yuna attempted to shred a pastry with her fingers rather than eat it.  
  
When Yuna finally annihilated the pastry that Lulu had been intending to claim for herself, she decided that perhaps a most direct tactic was called for.  
  
"Is there something wrong?" she asked.  
  
Yuna didn't glance up from the pastry. "Not at all, Lulu. I told you before."  
  
"Ah," Lulu said, "So you did."  
  
There was silence for another few minutes, occasionally broken by the sound of dying pastry, or Lulu's spoon as she stirred sweetening into her tea.  
  
"Are you quite sure?" she asked.  
  
"Yes!" Yuna bite out, rather harshly in Lulu's opinion.  
  
"Because you do not seem well."  
  
"I know myself, Lulu," Yuna said, frowning. "I am well."  
  
Lulu nodded briskly. "In that case, perhaps you would not be disagreeable towards meeting the High Priest of Besaid Temple. He has heard of your statements regarding Sin and the Fayth, and wanted to have a chance to talk to you about the possibility-"  
  
Lulu tried not to start at Yuna jumped to her feet, the chair banging to the floor in her rush to stand. Yuna had clenched her hands into fists, though she was clearly trying to relax them.   
  
"I'm sorry, Lulu," she said finally, "I don't feel like tea this morning. And please pass my apologies to the Priest. I will not be meeting him today."  
  
Yuna fled the hut, the flowers outside trampled noisily as she ran out. There were a few startled cries from the nearby villagers, presumably at seeing the High Summoner running out of her hut in her nightgown.  
  
Lulu sipped her tea sanguinely. Ten minutes, she decided. She would allow Yuna ten minutes to collect her thoughts and then she would follow her.  
  
**  
  
As she stared at the path she had to descend, Lulu somewhat regretted allowing Yuna to get to her destination. She had never feared for Yuna's life; the fiends of Besaid were hardly of significance to a woman who had faced Sin and won. But Yuna, it seemed, had fled to the same place she had as a child, when something or someone had made her upset. And she had fled here precisely because of its inaccessibility.  
  
Before the ruins of an old civilisation that made its presence tangibly felt on the road to the village, there were waterfalls, and further down the cliff there were outcroppings and caves that wove into the very rock of the island itself. There was a safe path, Lulu knew, that was startlingly free of rock slime and water, and let someone small hide underneath the lip of an outcropping, perfectly dry and protecting from all sight and sound.  
  
It had been Yuna's secret place, until one day where the girl had lost track of the time and had fallen asleep in her little cubby-hole. Kimahri had worked most of the village into a panic when the girl had stumbled back, unaware of any reason she could have worried people. The next time Yuna had disappeared, Lulu had followed her and found the secret place that the girl was fond of.  
  
But she had never tried to get down there herself.  
  
Lulu sighed. She was perfectly agile, as she had to be to avoid some of the quicker fiends that prowled Spira, but the thought of descending down slippery rocks to find this apparently safe path in her current attire was not one she revelled in. Still there was nothing else to be done. With a deep breath, she pulled off her impractical shoes, and used one hand to hitch her skirts up, and the other to hold onto the rocks before she began her somewhat tenuous trip down the cliff side.  
  
There were a few rather unnerving moment when Lulu felt her footing slip, or couldn't find another rock to grip. And more than once, she found herself ducking under the lip of outcroppings only to find that it was without a High Summoner crouched under them, unfortunately soaking herself in the process.  
  
So when Lulu finally located Yuna, and arrived looking harried, barefoot, and bedraggled, Yuna actually laughed, even if it was a slightly hollow laugh without the usual soul that Lulu associated with her.   
  
"Oh... hush," she said, for lack of a better thing to say, and sat down next to Yuna. Her only satisfaction being that Yuna's nightgown seemed to be in just as bad a state as Lulu felt.  
  
She seated herself on the stone next to Yuna, and tried to wring water from her braids with only a little success. They hung, limp and cold, down her back and dribbled water down the inside of her gown. Lulu shivered. "I brave catching a chill for you, Yuna. I hope you appreciate this token of my devotion."  
  
"Your devotion has never been under question," Yuna said softly, fingers toying with her earring, before her mouth twisted wryly. "Neither has your stubbornness."  
  
Lulu swiped at a drop of water that hung at the tip of her nose. "Stubbornness," she said, "Is considered an admirable quality in a black mage. When one is in training, one must be stubborn enough to put up with the minor irritant of being unable to aim spells correctly and injuring oneself more often than not."  
  
Yuna arched an eyebrow sceptically. "You hit yourself with your own spells."  
  
"Of course not," Lulu said, haughtily. "I performed perfectly."  
  
"Of course," Yuna repeated, smiling slightly before that expression faltered, and, with a small sigh, she drew her legs to her chest and rested her chin on her knees. "Why did you follow me?"   
  
Lulu stared at Yuna, as if she couldn't understand the question. "How could I not?" she finally asked. "You are my dear sister, and you are in pain of some sort. You would have me ignore it?"  
  
"I would have you respect my wishes, Guardian, and stay out of my affairs."  
  
Lulu stiffened at the formal tone, and firmly beat back the reflexive impulse to obey because she must. "You," she said, in a voice designed to remind the girl of exactly who was the elder here, "Are no longer a Summoner, my Lady, and I am no longer your Guardian." She hesitated a moment, and when she spoke again, her words were softer, more entreating. "But I am your friend. And I am a friend who is so worried. You are not yourself, Yuna. Kimahri's leaving is sad, but Wakka and I are still here. We love you also."  
  
Yuna shook her head. "I miss Kimahri dreadfully, but his absence is nothing more than a dull ache." She began fiddling with her earring again. "I only wish him well in his travels."  
  
"Then, forgive me, but there must be something dreadfully wrong."  
  
Silence, broken only by the splattering of water droplets on stone.  
  
"What has happened," Lulu asked, "That is so terrible?"  
  
Again Yuna was silent. The silence stretched on for so long that Lulu began to grow worried.   
  
"Yuna? Talk to me?"  
  
"The healer..." Yuna trailed off.  
  
"Did she do something? Say something?" Lulu was incensed, and one could almost feel the air about them crackle with suppressed thunder spells, as the mage struggled to hold back the best way she had of expressing her outrage. "I'll speak to her, I'll-"  
  
"No." Yuna interrupted, placing a restraining hand on Lulu's arm. "It wasn't the healer. Not directly anyway. It was... It is something about me. Something she told me."  
  
**  
  
Unlike some people that she knew who hated healers, their visits, their medicines and their attitudes, Yuna had a fairly neutral attitude towards them. She was a healer herself, though that had not been her life's goal, and so her manner of healing was a knowledge of the white magics that would cure on the battlefield. She could not diagnose illness, or cure disease. She could only Send those the healers had failed to the Farplane when she was asked to. She neither liked nor loathed them in general, though she was quickly coming to despise the woman that Lulu had summoned from her chambers within the temple.  
  
The woman had entered, becoming rather displeased with the fact that Yuna had not returned the devotional prayer motion of those who followed the Yevon faith, before covering it up with her officious attitude. She had bustled around, forcing Yuna to lie atop her bed, ignoring the insistence that the High Summoner was not an invalid, asking probing questions about her diet, her activities recently, and anything unusual that might have happened lately.  
  
After Yuna had finished recounting the telling of the death of Sin, the healer was starting to look like she wished she had not asked, and didn't push any further with her questions. Instead the woman, a mousy looking thing, busied herself with physical and magical tests. She ran her hands across Yuna's body, feeling out signs of injury, and cast curative spells to purge her of any lingering poison that might have been left in her body by Sin.  
  
Yuna privately doubted the effectiveness of spells on a substance that was not present, but she let the healer do it if that was what she wished. She had no real desire to get into a disagreement with the woman over something so petty. It was when the healer cast a diagnostic spell and suddenly clapped her hands together that Yuna became more than a little confused.  
  
"Lady High Summoner, I cannot believe such a thing. How marvellous, you are such a fortunate woman indeed."  
  
Yuna wondered, in an abstract way, if the healer had discovered that her insides had turned to Gil or some other such thing. "What is it?"  
  
"A miracle, High Summoner, a miracle. Why all of Spira would rejoice in such tidings!"  
  
Yuna started to sit up, flattening her mouth in annoyance. "Are you going to tell me what you have found out?"  
  
"Why! My lady! It's wonderful, you're pregnant!"  
  
Yuna thought she was going to pass out. Or throw up. She settled for swallowing, trying to impart some moisture to a suddenly dry throat and mouth.  
  
"That's not possible," she whispered.  
  
"Of course it is, my lady. Do not tell me you were never told about the basic knowledge of life?" The healer smirked, waving her hands above Yuna's body, the musky scent of 'scan' tainting the air once again. "I am quite certain, and have never been mistaken yet."  
  
Yuna raised a hand, rather shakily, to her abdomen. There was nothing there to feel, perhaps a slight bulge though Yuna had put that down to retaining water. True, she had not marked the arrival of her monthly cycle, but she had been warned before she left on the Pilgrimage that the physical strain of the journey took its toll on female bodies. Summoners often lost so much weight and were involved in such vigorous activities during battle and the like that the bodies of females sometimes put a halt on the more unnecessary functions. Like reproduction.  
  
"Of course, no female Summoner has ever given birth after beginning their Pilgrimage," The healer's lips quirked into a smile that fell when she saw that her audience didn't seem to be sharing in her amusement. "They don't usually live long enough to give birth," she continued. "Who knows what the effects will be on a half-breed child, conceived while the Summoner was so close to the Fayth."  
  
The healer leaned forward conspiratorially. "Also, no pregnant woman has been as close to Sin as you, my lady, and... well... either lived or failed to miscarry shortly thereafter."  
  
Yuna stared at the healer. "Half-breed?" she echoed.  
  
The healer straightened, raising her nose officiously. "Well of course I presume the father is your husband."  
  
"Of course," Yuna echoed again, dully this time. She began to wish she hadn't allowed the ladies of the village to let her marital status become common knowledge.  
  
"Well, Lady, I think it's fairly obvious why you've been feeling a little under the weather recently." The healer rummaged in her bag as the spoke, giving off the air of someone only marginally interested in the conversation. "You've been running around, fighting battles and killing things, living off those dreadful excuses for food substitutes they call 'trail rations'."  
  
The healer straightened, pulling out a small leather-wrapped packet, which she unwrapped to reveal dried herbs. Checking them over, she nodded to herself and resealed the packet. "These you drink as tea to combat any nausea you might feel. Don't use them too much though, or they'll lose their effectiveness." She pressed the packet into Yuna's hands, along with a list of foodstuffs which Yuna was supposed to steer clear of, and picked up her bag.  
  
"I'll need to see you fairly regularly from now on. Once a week should suffice for now, please come up to the Temple to see me. I can't always be making house calls after all."  
  
The healer reverenced in the manner of Yevon and made as if to leave.  
  
"Wait."  
  
Yuna's raised voice stopped her in her tracks.  
  
"You," Yuna said, sharply, "Are not to tell anyone else of my 'condition', or you will answer to me."  
  
The healer straightened, offended. "Of course not, my lady. I would never dream of such a thing." And she bustled out of door, to the sounds of worried enquiries from Yuna's Guardians.  
  
Taking a deep breath and pasting a smile on her face, Yuna followed after the healer, determined to convince them all that there was nothing wrong with her at all. Not even something she had never thought to even contemplate might happen.  
  
**  
  
"Oh."  
  
Silence.  
  
"Oh."  
  
Lulu frowned, lowering her head. "Oh," she finally said, even quieter than before. "Why didn't you say something?"  
  
"I don't know. Perhaps I wanted it all to go away. I thought... maybe you'd all think less of me for it."  
  
"Yuna!" Lulu said chidingly, "You took comfort from someone during your Pilgrimage, how could we think less of you for that?"  
  
She didn't realise that Yuna had stopped breathing in fear.  
  
"Who was it?" Lulu asked, folding an arm about Yuna's shoulders. "Was it him?" There was no doubt that she was referring to the blonde Guardian who had stolen Yuna's heart and then faded away with it.  
  
But whatever answer Lulu had been expected, she didn't anticipate the harsh bark of laughter the younger woman uttered.  
  
"Seymour. It actually was Seymour." Yuna sounded small and far away, her thoughts mired in another time and place. "In Bevelle, before the wedding he-" She broke off, unable to finished.  
  
"But-" Lulu was apparently so shocked she was lost for words. Finally, she blurted out, "He was dead!" What she perhaps wanted to say was 'But he was a murderer. But he tried to kill us all. But he tried to destroy the world! And you slept with him?'  
  
Yuna shrugged faintly. "He was able to take life, to forge new living shells of armour from souls, and you find it so incredible he was able to grant life? Perhaps I did also, which is why I did not consider the possibility. He didn't rape me, didn't force me. I was willing, if that makes any difference, though hardly willing in my heart. I needed him to trust me, to believe in my assertion that I was willing to marry him. I needed time to Send him." Yuna bit her lip. "He was surprisingly considerate, actually. Maybe I expected more violence from him because of everything he did. Because of what, perhaps, I had some inkling of what he intended to do. I convinced myself I was prepared to handle whatever he inflicted on me."  
  
She cautiously raised a hand, pressing it lightly against her abdomen. She chuckled mirthlessly. "I wasn't expecting him to inflict this on me, though."  
  
"Why did you let him?" Lulu shook her head. "Oh, Yuna, I can't understand why you'd be prepared to do something like that. You didn't have to."  
  
"But I did. There was no other way. Nothing that would not have made him distrust me."  
  
"You should have told him you weren't ready."  
  
"You don't understand, Lulu," Yuna said sadly. She turned away and closed her eyes, and Lulu was left to stare at the patterns of light the waterfall splashed onto her face that gave her a faintly ethereal look. "Have you ever heard of the phrase 'temple prostitution'?"  
  
**  
  
"Now then, Yuna dear, we need to Talk."  
  
Yuna knew that tone of voice, and she could almost hear the capitalisation that gave the word its significance. She had, after all, heard it before. Lady Nadim, one of Yuna's instructors in the Summoning Arts, had been the one to tell Yuna about the Chocobos and the Bite Bugs when she had realised that Yuna's Ronso guardian had been remiss in instructing his charge in such matters.  
  
"What is it, Lady Nadim?" Yuna enquired politely, setting her pen down and folding her hands in her lap, abandoning the task of copying out the names of fiends that could be found in the Macalania region.  
  
"I need to tell you something of Temple etiquette," Lady Nadim said, carefully, taking a seat on the cushions on the floor next to Yuna. The older, stately woman pursed her lips together as she tried to think of how best to phrase it. "I need to forewarn you of what you might encounter when trying to reach the Chambers of the Fayth."  
  
Yuna frowned slightly, searching her memory and becoming all the more confused of why Nadim was talking to her of such things. "Father Mathers already explained to me the Trials-"  
  
"No, Yuna," interrupted Lady Nadim gently, "I speak not of the mazes, but a different sort of trial." Lady Nadim closed her eyes and lowered her head. "Often, before granting a Summoner entrance to the Trials and the Fayth beyond, Priests and Priestesses have been known to demand gifts that are not Gil nor trinkets that may take their fancy."  
  
Then she was silent so long that Yuna began to wonder if her venerable instructor had fallen asleep. It was then that Yuna's mind made the connection between 'gift-giving' and 'Talk', and she realised what it was the Lady Nadim was saying.  
  
"Oh," Yuna said, in a very quiet voice.  
  
Lady Nadim raised her head, smiling gently and taking Yuna's small cold hand in her own, giving it a reassuring pat. "Not all the Temples demand this. They may all, or none may. It always very much depends upon who is in charge in the places you may visit. Priests and Priestesses of Yevon hold so little else over the Summoners, sometimes I feel as if this is one method they use of controlling us."  
  
If Yuna had not been such a devout acolyte of Yevon, and if she had known then what she would later come to realise about the church, she would have recognised something of what Lady Nadim was trying to tell her. Instead, all she could think of was the information Lady Nadim had suddenly given her. She glanced down at the table, and at her neat printing of names, and was so disconnected from the world about her that she could barely read the words.  
  
Lady Nadim sighed then, and Yuna would later recall this when she discovered that the woman was a fallen Summoner, who had reached the palace of St. Bevelle before retiring from her Pilgrimage, and said, "Yuna, my child, if you have any wish for your first time to have meaning, take it before you depart on your Pilgrimage, or you may find yourself regretting it."  
  
Yuna would later wonder what had been demanded of Nadim at Bevelle that had made this woman give up on her Pilgrimage.  
  
**  
  
The sound of the splashing waterfall was like thunder, and was all that filled the little alcove for a few minutes. Finally, Lulu asked,  
  
"Did you? Before we left on the Pilgrimage...?"  
  
Yuna shook her head, refusing to meet Lulu's eyes.  
  
"Why didn't you tell us?"  
  
"You would have become angered at the idea, all of you. It was kinder to say nothing. The life of a Summoner is one of sacrifices; this was simply one of them."  
  
Lulu raised a hand to her face. "I'm amazed you can be so calm about it."  
  
"I wasn't calm, not at first. But I grew to accept the idea, even if I did not like it. I was a Summoner. I had nothing to live for, but I had all of Spira to die for." Yuna glanced back at Lulu. "In some ways it was not so distasteful. He was gentle, courteous, and it was in many ways not a chore." She closed her eyes, and Lulu caught sight of tears that spilled down her cheeks with the action. "It could so easily have been different."  
  
"But it wasn't." Lulu tried to keep the harshness from her voice, but couldn't help herself. She remembered Kimahri's anguish at finding the Maester had killed his tribe. She recalled the pain and fighting she and her comrades had suffered at Seymour's hands. She knew who he had murdered to get to his position, and what he intended for Spira.  
  
"I know," Yuna said, "He was a murderer. But I carried his Mother's Aeon. It's hard to be judgemental of him, when I touched the dreams of one who felt so unconditionally for him."  
  
Lulu hesitated slightly. "Yuna... there are... roots and herbs. They can... absolve you of this problem."  
  
Yuna's breath hitched, staring into Lulu's face with shock, not believing that such a thing could be suggested. Or perhaps she had never considered it.  
  
Lulu looked back into Yuna's face with quiet concern, watching the play of emotions that was ranging across the girl, wondering what her next action would be. "Yuna?" she asked, tentatively.  
  
Yuna broke down, feeling the tears flowing freely, and her breath caught in sobs. She wrapped her arms around Lulu's waist, rested her head in the mage's lap, and felt Lulu's fingers soothingly stroke her hair.  
  
"Oh, Yuna. What happened?" Lulu asked gently, not ceasing in the motion of her hands.  
  
So Yuna broke her self-imposed oath never to tell another living, or dead, soul of what had happened between herself and the Maester of Yevon, and began, her voice watery, to tell her friend everything.  
  
**  
  
It was the birds, Yuna had decided; the birds that sat in the meticulously maintained blossom trees outside of her window. They did so insist on singing. In the bright, fresh morning in the city of Bevelle, the sound of their chirruping sounded like taunting to Yuna, teasing her with a freedom she could not have, and in all likelihood would never have again. Even if she climbed out of the window, she would only find herself upon a balcony. Granted, it was a huge balcony that contained a garden, but it was still a garden that was suspended many stories above the ground.  
  
She had a plan to survive such a jump, but she knew it would be futile. If she were to do that, she would never complete the mission she had assigned herself. She was trapped more by her duty than she was by the guards in the hallway, and the distance to the ground.  
  
Perhaps the Maesters knew that. Perhaps that was why obvious security was absent.  
  
Yuna's fingers plucked nervously at the bed coverings she sat upon, and even in her state of agitation she couldn't help but luxuriate in their softness; such a change from weeks of sleeping upon thin and ragged bedrolls in tents, often awakenings damp and sore after a night in the wild. Her body, unused to the gentle support, had rebelled, and now she was suffering from the most horrendous pain, the muscles in her neck having seized up and gone into spasm.  
  
She got to her feet, striding over to the window, with every intention of slamming them closed, but stopped as her legs bumped into the window seat, staring out over the city. From here, she could see the ocean, and the sprawl of the city. She could see the gardens the likes of which couldn't be cultivated anywhere other than Bevelle, for the simple reason of the even present threat of Sin.  
  
She sighed, feeling overwhelmed, and sat down dejectedly on the seat. Even if she succeeded in Sending Seymour, she would never escape here alive. Her death would bring one man to justice, but she would never defeat Sin. The world would continue to know the threat of the monster who killed and destroyed relentlessly. Perhaps one of the other Summoners would succeed, but what if they didn't?  
  
It was a sort of arrogance, Yuna supposed, but one that Summoners needed. They had to be know beyond doubt that they would defeat Sin, otherwise they faltered, and could not go through with what had to be done.  
  
She folded her hands in her lap, staring at her fingers. She felt miserable enough to cry.  
  
Her head was brought up as she heard voices in the corridor, and thought they were passing guards until they stopped outside the door and sounded all too familiar. Yuna hastily swiped at her eyes with her sleeve to hide the tell-tale traces of burgeoning tears, and stood up as they door swung open to admit Maester Seymour.  
  
"Sit down, Lady Yuna," he said, gesturing to the window seat which still bore the imprint of her weight amongst its cushions.   
  
She did so. "I was not expecting to see you," she said, fighting the temptation to turn away and stare out at the trees so she wouldn't have to look at him. "As you were busy with your duties. Or so the ladies said." Those ladies being the gaggling mob that had come to measure her for her wedding gown two days earlier, and who couldn't stop talking about how marvellous it was that Yuna was marrying Seymour, and how they were all so jealous.  
  
It had made Yuna want to seize her staff from where she had laid it folded against a wall and smack them individually over the head. Yevon had allowed her to keep the weapon, but Yuna suspected that it was only a display of the power they held over her. As far as they were concerned, even armed Yuna was no threat.  
  
"My duties are not so pressing they forbid me time spent with my bride-to-be."  
  
Yuna wondered if that insufferably smug tone had always been present in his voice, or he only felt secure enough to allow it to creep in now, when his path seemed certain. "Of course," she said, with a faint smile she was sure looked as false as it felt, "I am gratified."  
  
This was perhaps the worst part. She had convinced him after he had kidnapped her from the Al-Bhed Home that she did mean to marry him, as she had stated at Macalania Temple. It had only been the interference of her Guardians that had made her feel compelled to change her mind. It wouldn't be until Yuna faced her namesake in Zanarkand and learned the truth behind the Final Summoning that she would realise why Seymour needed her to enter a bond with him willingly.  
  
Now she did turn her head away and towards the window, wincing as the muscles in her neck protested at the moment and sent a sharp stab of pain through her temples. She raised her hand to her neck, feeling the knots in the muscles crunch as she pressed down on them. It wasn't much of a relief, but it was better than nothing.  
  
"Are you well, my lady?" He asked, taking note of the way she attempted to work out the kink.   
  
"It's just a little muscle pain. I will be fine." Yuna dropped her hand to her lap and attempted to dress her face in an expression that would be convincing for the lie she had just spun.  
  
"Of course, but I would be remiss if I ignored it."  
  
She was about to protest when she felt his fingers, thinner and more delicate looking than a Human's, but deceptive in their appearance of weakness, digging into her neck and shoulders. He moved his fingertips in rhythmic circles, careful not to catch her skin with his wicked looking nails. He sought out the knots of bunched muscle in sinew, rubbing at them until they started to smooth out.  
  
In spite of herself, Yuna felt her body starting to relax, the relief from the nagging discomfort enough to overcome the tension she had felt at his touching her. Deciding, for a moment, that it would not harm her resolve to bring Jyscal's killer to justice, Yuna gave herself over the warm soothing sensation of the massage and let her head loll forward. A whispered spell, and the scent of fresh greens brought with it a lack of pain in her abused muscles.  
  
Seymour was, Yuna decided, far too good at this.  
  
She stood, dislodging his hands, unconsciously running her fingers over the skin he had been touching, the after-effect of the magic making her nerves tingle. "Thank you, Lord Seymour," she said, forcing herself to fold her hands before her.   
  
"So formal?" Seymour asked, languidly taking up the seat she had just vacated. "We are to be wed tomorrow morning, Lady Yuna, surely such formalities should be put aside."  
  
In truth Yuna liked the distance the formalities gave her, but she relented nonetheless. "I believe I can do that... Seymour."  
  
He smiled at her. "Sit down, Yuna," he said, once again.  
  
Yuna obeyed silently, refusing to allow herself to twist her fingers together as she wanted to, and had that problem solved when he clasped both of her hands in his, and tugged her closer, towards him.   
  
"There is something I must tell you of," he said, and Yuna swallowed convulsively. She couldn't contemplate what he might want to say. Her mind was whirling too nervously for her to put together a coherent thought. Instead, she just nodded, indicating he should continue.  
  
"There is," he said, "A tradition amongst the Guado. A marriage is, in itself, meaningless. But it does signify the recognition of a union between two people who have already bonded on the most intimate of levels."  
  
Yuna opened her mouth, closed it again and swallowed, her eyes fixed upon their intertwined fingers as she tried to form a sentence. When she finally looked up, she saw Seymour gazing at her with thinly veiled amusement, though, it seemed, it was not malicious, but affectionate. She felt ill, and all she could see was Lady Nadim's face warning her of what was to be expected of a Summoner on her Pilgrimage.  
  
Seymour, it seemed, took her silence for confusion, which was not too far from the truth, and continued, "Yuna, I speak of the intimacy that Humans know as the purview of the already wed, but the Guado consider a prerequisite. My lady, I would have us bind ourselves together in such a manner."  
  
**  
  
"And you BELIEVED him?"   
  
Lulu, in spite of indicating she would remain quiet, apparently couldn't stop herself.  
  
"Good grief, Yuna, I know you're young and inexperienced but I thought that you of all people had more sense than that! That has to be one of the most ridiculous-"  
  
"Actually," Yuna said, the corners of her mouth twitching. "He wasn't lying. I looked it up. Later, of course, when we had escaped and resumed the Pilgrimage. Some of Rin's employees are very well educated on the matter of customs."  
  
Lulu made incoherent sounds of disbelief, but fell silent again as Yuna carried on speaking.  
  
**  
  
Yuna licked her lips. "I am... flattered," she finally said, choosing her words carefully. "That you would consider our union a given."  
  
"Not a given," Seymour corrected, "Merely a formality. A way to show Spira the joining between Summoner and Maester."  
  
"A political alliance," Yuna said, inclining her head slightly. "It would give the people hope."  
  
"I confess, Yuna," Seymour said. "I have rather become enamoured of your, your strength and courage. I would join you on your Pilgrimage, and follow you to Zanarkand itself and the Final Summoning."  
  
Yuna almost jerked her hands away in shock, but managed to only flinch at that statement. "You would? But-" She calmed herself from her initial outburst and took a deep breath. "You are a Summoner as am I. You know that death awaits me beyond the Final Summoning."  
  
Seymour looked a little distance, thinking of some other time perhaps. "I have walked the path of the Pilgrim," he said. "And know what awaits you. I would not wish you to face it alone."  
  
Not knowing his reasoning at the time, Yuna wondered for a long moment whether he truly did wish to support her in this, whether his motives were truly altruistic. He may have killed Jyscal, but was that an anomaly?  
  
No, she firmly told herself. He had killed Jyscal, and whether it was a single occurrence or not, he was a murderer. He was unsent, and as a Summoner, she was bound by Oath and Honour to see him to the Farplane. It was only the fact that it needed to be public that she endured this charade.  
  
And so what else could she do, but indicate her acquiescence, with a nod of the head and a whispered word.  
  
It wouldn't matter anyway.  
  
The chirruping of the birds in the blossom trees made her glance towards them, no pain causing her to arrest the motion this time, and she watch a delicate looking bird with brown and blue features tending to a nest of eggs, and the mother that sat atop them. The delicate pink petals obscured her sight of them partially, but she could still see them.   
  
"I had never thought this would happen," Yuna whispered, and then bit her lip, horrified she had spoken what she had intended to be a private thought out loud. Her head turned sharply, to see what Seymour's response to this would be.  
  
"I profess to being curious," Seymour said, his thumb moving across the back of her hand.  
  
Yuna offered a tremulous smile. "What of, my lord?"  
  
"No one," he asked, "Demanded your services on your journey thus far?"  
  
Yuna's throat seemed parched of all moisture, and shook her head somewhat timidly.  
  
"Ah, then I am glad for you," Seymour said, and she jerked her head up to stare at him.  
  
He stroked her cheek and smiled at her shock. "That your innocence was not bartered for the Fayth, like cheap currency."  
  
But that was what she was doing now, was it not? Exchanging her virtue for justice? For the chance to show to Spira exactly who Jyscal's killer was? Such a hurriedly thought-up plan, when she had discovered that it was Seymour who'd arrange for her 'liberation' from the Al-Bhed so that they could be wed under the gaze of Spira, and she had committed herself to carrying it through. Yuna was too well-trained in the obligations of duty to consider it an unfair trade.  
  
Which was why, when Seymour leaned in towards her, his lips finding hers, that she did her best to swallow her revulsion at the fact she was engaged in a rather intimate embrace with a murderer and simply attempted not to think of much of anything for a while.  
  
**  
  
There wasn't the sound of speech between Lulu and Yuna after the latter had finished speaking. Yuna just laid there, head on Lulu's lap while the mage stroked her hair soothingly.   
  
Finally, Lulu said, "You did what you had to."  
  
"I know."  
  
"None would blame you for it."  
  
Yuna sighed and closed her eyes. "I know."  
  
Perhaps Lulu was trying to convince herself of that, more than she was Yuna.   
  
"Come on," she finally said, "Let's go back to the hut. You need to get changed out of those wet clothes."  
  
**  
  
When they got back to the hut, and Lulu had mothered Yuna appropriately, making her warm tea, finding her a change of clothes and disposing of her now rather wet and slimy nightgown in the laundry basket, Yuna felt rather a lot better than she had upon awakening that morning. Telling Lulu the story had freed her spirit immensely, and the road ahead did not look nearly so intimidating.  
  
Lulu bit her lip anxiously, just as Yuna was starting to relax, immediately dispelling that soothing calm that she'd been feeling. "Yuna, I have to tell Wakka."  
  
Yuna looked up at her, before glancing away again.  
  
"I think he deserves to know," Lulu continued, "He has been your staunch guardian since before your Pilgrimage. Would you have him find out later, and find out that you hid this knowledge from him?"  
  
Yuna hesitated, and then shook her head. "Of course not, Lulu. Wakka deserves far more than that. You all do." She tightened her grip around her warm tea that was almost gone, leaving only the dregs and the sediment collecting in the bottom of the mug. "You can tell him. I don't think I have the strength to."  
  
Lulu smiled, but it was one without any humour, and her eyes were sad.   
  
It was much later in the day, when Yuna had retired to her bed, emotional exhaustion translating itself into physical, that Lulu found herself standing outside Wakka's hut, trying to think of how best to broad the subject with him. She couldn't think of how best to start, and Marta, the former Apprentice Summoner who had begun working with one of the seamstresses, was giving her increasingly odder looks the longer that Lulu lingered there.  
  
When she finally gathered up enough courage to push back the curtain and step inside, having decided to wait and see how the conversation evolved, she was rather disappointed when she discovered that he wasn't actually inside. Feeling unaccountably disgruntled, she stood in the middle of his floor, arms folded and glaring at the doorway, waiting for him to return and trying not to turn Yuna's situation over and over again in her mind.  
  
So when Wakka did return to his home, after having spent the morning on the beach helping the fishermen repair nets, he wondered what he had done wrong to earn Lulu's ire. "Lu?" he asked, nervously.  
  
"Where have you been? Never mind." She cut him off even as he opened his mouth to speak her. "You're never around when I need you to be."  
  
Wakka rather thought that this was a little unfair on Lulu's part, but since something was obviously distressing her, he ignored it. "Want some tea? I got some breads from the baker, but, I don' know, he's doing something funny to his dough. Tastes strange, ya know? I've half a mind to say so, I do..."  
  
Lulu had wilted by this point, her irritation dispelling as easily as the wind blows away the clouds. "Wakka," she said tiredly, sitting herself on his bed, "Will you listen? I have to tell you something. It's about Yuna."  
  
Wakka turned back from the stove he had crossed towards, moving to her side and sitting down next to her, folding an arm around her shoulders. "What is it, Lu?"  
  
Taking a deep breath, Lulu began to tell her friend everything, leaving nothing out of what she had been told, and doing her best to ignore the shock that had stole onto Wakka's features and remained there throughout her telling.  
  
It never occurred to Lulu, though, that someone else might be listening to the tale.  
  
- End of Part Five 


	6. Tricks of the Trade

**  
  
Part Six: Tricks of the Trade  
  
**  
  
Rikku had come to somewhat dislike mountains. She had all too vivid memories of crossing Mount Gagazet in clothing far too inappropriate for the conditions they had found themselves in. She remembered that the team had too often found themselves huddled in the shelter of a cliff, or even a niche in the rock, around a fire that whoever was awake enough to spellcast would keep alive with magic, and sometimes someone would fall victim to burgeoning hypothermia, and they would be unable to continue until they had been restored to full health.  
  
Rikku remembered not noticing the signs of her own suffering at one point as they were nearing the summit, and collapsing in the snow next to Auron, too tired to even shiver. Which was why she, and the other Al-Bhed who had joined her on this little expedition atop one of the lower mountains in a small island chain in the east (nowhere near as tall as Gagazet but still fairly imposing in itself), were all dressed in thermal gear. Rikku had never been as glad for simple clothing before.  
  
They were on a small plateau, which had been found at the top of a winding path. A metallurgist named Sanga had found the path, obscured by rocks at the foot of the mountain, and now they reached the top, they thought they found the reason why someone had taken such pains to hide the route.  
  
Overlooking the rest of the island, standing proudly before a green landscape faintly obscured from this altitude by mists, was a door, all brass and carved stone, and inset into the door was a symbol easily six feet wide and half that again high. It was the symbol of Yevon, and Rikku could not fathom what it was doing here.  
  
There were no temples or churchs nearby, indeed this entire island was uninhabited, which was why Rikku and her team had been there. The airship had dropped them off two days earlier before it departed to take other teams to islands where they could conduct their own surveys. Time was important, said Cid. The faster they found a suitable location, the faster they could begin to refound Home. And so they had split up.  
  
Rikku wriggled her fingers absent-mindedly, attempting to get the blood in her extremities circulating a little better. She had lost sensation in her fingertips some time ago, and it was becoming difficult to manipulate any of the finer equipment they had brought with them. Not that she needed to. After efforts to locate the opening mechanism had failed, the stronger members of the party had resorted to the 'brute force and ignorance' approach and were simply trying to force the door open.  
  
It was as good an idea as any they had at the moment, so Rikku didn't stop them. She had a feeling the medics would be seeing several sprained shoulders and thrown backs in the next few days, though.  
  
She wondered what could lie behind. Machina weapons that Yevon was known to keep in reserve (though she had a feeling what they'd seen at Bevelle was all they had)? Could it be Gil, perhaps, some hidden cache of currency from the wealthy organisations funds? Or maybe it was rare items, kept hidden.  
  
This was why Rikku had enjoyed treasure hunts as a child.  
  
"Rikku!"  
  
The girl flinched at the urgent, yet hushed call from the edge of the plateau, where Sanga was keeping guard. He gestured her closer silently, and around them the rest of the Al-Bhed seemed to take the hint that they should quieten down as well. The heaving against the door stopped, those who had been working massaging sore muscles as they looked after Rikku and Sanga anxiously.  
  
Rikku hurried forward, gripping Sanga's arm as he indicated down the mountain path.  
  
"Yevon," he said grimly.  
  
Rikku swallowed, licking lips anxiously that had chapped in the cold. She narrowed her eyes and could just make out what the eagle-eyed Sanga had seen. There was a veritable entourage making its way up the thin and winding path that led all the way up the mountainside. The path was treacherous, but the group moved with such ease that it spoke of long familiarity with the area. Rikku thought she caught sight of the glimpse of metal off machina weapons, and the shine of the armour of the warrior monks.  
  
"Damn," she said, resisting the urge to review a few of her father's choicer turns of phrase. With the speed the Yevonites were moving, it would be only a few minutes before they reached the Al-Bhed positions, and as Rikku was the leader of their group, it was up to her to make a decision.  
  
She whirled, eyes hurriedly searching the area. They couldn't take the path back down, so what to do? Her eyes flickered upwards. There was still plenty more mountain above them. Craggy uneven rocks would provide plenty of hiding spaces, if they moved quickly enough.  
  
"Up!" she ordered, in a hissed tone.  
  
No one argued. Those who had equipment picked it up hurriedly and started for the rocks, just behind those who had been empty handed. Shale and pebbles scattered in their wake, and would hopefully settle before the Yevonites arrived. The only sounds could be heard were the scrabbling footsteps of the team and harsh breathing as they attempted to move faster than their bodies wanted to in the cold.  
  
Rikku was last, checking to make sure everyone had secreted themselves away, and by then the Yevonites were turning the last curve of the pathway before they reached the plateau. She scrambled upwards, feeling sharp stones bite into her chilled hands, and one or two breaking the skin and causing them to bleed. Most of the better hiding places had been taken by the time Rikku tried to conceal herself, and she was forced to duck behind a rock that was far lower than she would have chosen with more time. She was simply glad that the cold weather gear was a dirty grey and so allowed her to blend all the better in with the surrounding stone.   
  
She tried to raise her head enough to see what was going on without being spotted, pulling the hood of her jacket up to hide her hair. Having made herself uncomfortable, Rikku tried not to move, knowing any motion would give away their poorly hidden locations. She watched the Yevonites enter the platform, silently counting them off in her head.  
  
There were nine in total, and fully eight of them were warrior monks, all of them looking rather chilled at the cold temperatures. Condensation had formed on their armour, and a few of them were dripping water onto the ground. At the very centre of their perfectly square formation was a woman, tall and statuesque, clad in the thick and undoubtedly warm garb of a Priestess of Yevon and looking distinctly more comfortable than her guards.  
  
Rikku frowned. A Priestess with eight monks guarding her? What were they expecting to face? Had they known the Al-Bhed were there? Was this an attack? If so, it was a very poorly executed one.  
  
Then the ranks broke apart, giving the Priestess a clear path to the door that had to resisted the Al-Bhed attempts to force it open. She took a deep breath, the moisture from it misting the air heavily. In a graceful, dance-like motion, she waved her arms in a flourish, bowing deeply in the manner of the Yevonite blessing. The symbol on the door glowed a dull pink and there was a grinding noise of stone against stone. The door slowly, painfully, ground its way open.  
  
No wonder they hadn't been able to open it, thought Rikku, smiling unseen. You would never find an Al-Bhed praying to Yevon to open a door.  
  
The priestess led the way into the chamber beyond, followed by the monks. All went quiet, and Rikku was starkly aware of the harsh breaths she was taking, as were all of her fellows. A wonder that the warrior monks hadn't heard them and shot them all by now.   
  
The plateau was silent and empty for a long time. As the time they had been sitting, hidden and cramped, reached nearly a quarter of an hour, Rikku was starting to think that maybe the Yevonites had taken another way out of the mountain. What could possibly be occupying them so long?  
  
Still, she didn't move. They wouldn't break their cover until they knew for sure that the Yevonites wouldn't emerge and try and kill them all. So she waited. She counted to a hundred in Al-Bhed, and then in the common language, before she tried to do the same in the rather tenuous Ronso that Kimahri had taught her, before giving up somewhere around thirteen. And having only passed a few minutes, she began to mentally list the names of all the fiends she knew, in alphabetical order. She reached 'Dingo' before she gave up and dully watched the cave entrance.  
  
It was nearly an hour after they had entered that the Yevonites exited the cave, and Rikku thought she would never have sensation in her fingers again, not to mention that her calf muscles had cramped up something dreadful.   
  
The priestess wasn't surrounded this time; instead, she lead the head of the entourage, striding briskly forward. But it wasn't this new arrangement that caused Rikku to utter a gasp she was almost certain that the warrior monks would have heard had they not been engrossed in their own task. What caused her to gasp was what they carried.  
  
It was an egg. Its size was almost ridiculous, being ten feet long and half that at its widest point. The white shell looked hard and near hatching, and was sprinkled with the lightest iridescent flecks that caught the bright sunlight atop the mountain and reflected it brightly into Rikku's eyes. She fought not to wince.  
  
The warrior monks, all eight of them that it took to lift this great egg, cradled it in a tarpaulin that they stretched between them. The moved a great deal slower than the speed they had used to arrive at the plateau. They were obviously very wary of dropping it.  
  
'What creature,' Rikku thought, horrified, 'Could possibly lay such an egg?'  
  
And she couldn't help but feel ill as she realised that whatever the creature was, it was clearly under Yevon's control.  
  
The entourage shuffled off the plateau, their steps cautious and guarded as they tried to prevent themselves from slipping. Rikku suspected that they were more worried about their precious cargo than their own lives. Expendable in the eyes of the church, she knew, and was disgusted about it.  
  
They left the door of the cave open behind them.  
  
The Al-Bhed remained hidden for a long time, listening to the steps faded away as the Yevonites descended the mountain path and off to wherever it was their ship was anchored. They waited more than the length of time it took to descend the mountain, and once they were reasonably sure it was safe, they started to emerge. Some curiously headed towards the now open cave, and Rikku and a few others tip-toed over to the edge of the plateau, looking down to see if they could locate the Yevonites. They were nowhere to be seen, but it seemed that everyone was loathe to speak and break the silence.  
  
"It occurs to me," Sanga said, making Rikku jump at the unexpected noise. "We have helped save Spira. We are hailed as friends for that. And yet we still hide, certain that Yevon would strike us down if they could."  
  
Rikku bit her lip, before she turned on her heel and followed the others into the cave.  
  
Inside, the relief from the cold was so abrupt that Rikku felt herself break out into a sweat almost immediately. It wasn't just shelter from the elements, though. Something was actively warming the room, giving it a faintly musty smell, and she supposed that the door hadn't been opened to allow in fresh air for some time. The room was high and wide, and looked more like a cavern than anything, though the walls were too smooth to be anything other than artifically hewn.  
  
Rikku dropped to her knees, ignoring the looks she received, and pressed her cheek against the rock and closed her eyes, feeling the gentle heat that seeped up through the stone. "Natural hypocaust," she pronounced. "Bet you this used to be a volcano. Probably blocked it off before it went completely inactive to keep things warm."  
  
Someone nearby snorted. "Crafty little buggers."  
  
It was obvious where the egg had lain. There was a natural indentation in the sand that covered the floor of the cave several feet deep after the halfway point to the back of the chamber. The footprints and trackmarks in the sand indicated the amount of struggle that had apparently gone into lifting the egg. No wonder they had taken so long before the Yevonites had emerged.  
  
Other than the sand, the cave was empty, and apart from the emblem on the doorway, there was no signage to be found anything. Not even an exit symbol. There was nothing to indicate what was held within, or what had been removed, and had Rikku and the others not watch the Yevonites, they would not have known anything other than a somewhat sandy cave, remarkably well protected, existed here.  
  
Rikku withdrew from the cavern, biting her lip as she surveyed the area, and cast her eyes downwards towards the unseen coastline, where the Yevonite ship undoubtedly lay.  
  
"Let's head back down to camp," Rikku said, glumly sticking her hands in her pockets. "I think it's safe to say that we're not going to be building Home here."  
  
**  
  
Wakka had come straight around with Lulu the moment he was told about Yuna's condition, and if the High Summoner had any doubts as to his feelings, they were dispelled as he, carefully, wrapped his arms around her in a hug.  
  
"Yuna, you should have said, ya know?"  
  
Yuna smiled faintly into his chest as he tightened his grip on her. "I know, I know."  
  
"Silly girl," he said, as he had so teased her when she was younger. But there was a tenseness in his voice now that he couldn't hide, though Yuna appreciated the effort. "You know we love you, right?"  
  
"I know," Yuna said, closing her eyes a moment.  
  
He eventually released her to sit down next to Lulu, but she didn't join them, instead pacing across her floor as they talked.  
  
"What will you do?" Lulu asked. It was something that Yuna had never elaborated on, even when Lulu had brought up the possibilities and options available to her.  
  
"I want to go to bed for a year," Yuna said. "I want to hide away until it all goes away, as childish a thought that may be."   
  
How long would the gestation period be for a child that was part Human, part Al-Bhed and part Guado? Yuna hadn't asked the healer, and suspected she wouldn't receive an answer.  
  
"You can't hide this forever," Lulu said, "It will become apparent, and you are a high profile personage, Yuna. People-" Lulu broke off, and looked away, a disturbed expression crossing her face as the thought occurred to her. "There are those who would think they could use the child of the High Summoner for their own gains."  
  
"Who could do such a thing?" Wakka said, somewhat angrily.  
  
Lulu gave him a steady look. "Yevon has been sending young men and women to their deaths for centuries, has it not?"  
  
Wakka didn't have an answer for that.  
  
"So, what will you do?" Lulu asked Yuna again.  
  
"I don't know," Yuna said, pacing a few steps to the side, dancing away from their eyes. "I don't think I had considered it." She raised a hand to her face, pushing her hair out of her face. "I wish... oh, I wish that I could just see him again and shout and scream and do those things I shouldn't." She laughed slightly, mirthlessly. "Or perhaps just ask: why me?"  
  
"The Farplane."  
  
Yuna turned her head to look at Wakka, who had been staring at the blue and white orb he held between his hands for most of the conversation. "Wakka?"  
  
"You should go to the Farplane." Wakka spun the blitzball that he had once left in Yuna's hut between his index fingers, having picked it up off the floor. "Maybe you should see that Seymour's there. And it might put your mind at rest, ya?"  
  
Yuna swallowed, turning away from both of them so that they couldn't see the fear in her eyes. She had spoken to neither of them regarding the fear she held that what she saw in the Farplane wasn't real, wasn't truly the dead, only the reflections of her memories, woven by sparks of magic that no one truly understood. But then Auron had been real enough, forged through those same pyreflies, and regardless of whether it was real or not, the Farplane only showed those who had died and been Sent.  
  
Perhaps that was what she needed. To see his face and know he no longer walked Spira.  
  
"Yuna?" Wakka again, and now he had also stood, looking at her worriedly. "You don't have to go, if you don't want to."  
  
Yuna turned to him, and she saw the startlement in their eyes as they caught sight of tears lying unshed in her eyes.  
  
"I think," she said, her breath hitching in her chest, "I think that I need to see him, to know that he is gone. What it will accomplish I do not know, but perhaps it would ease my own mind."  
  
Actually, she didn't know what would happen at all.  
  
Lulu was tapping her lips with her elegantly manicured nails, which she had somehow kept pristine in spite of spending several months fighting all the way to Zanarkand and back again. "If people know you are going to Guadosalam, you will be mobbed," she said, "We do not want people to know in advance you are going. Too many would ask questions."  
  
Yuna bit her lip. "I do not see how it could be otherwise. Word spreads quickly, faster than ships sail or birds fly."  
  
Lulu's expression told Yuna that the mage had already thought of a plan before she had begun speaking, and now the woman revealed it. "Then as far as anyone will be concerned, you will not have left." She glanced between Wakka and Yuna folding her hands in her lap and nodded sharply in agreement with herself. "Wakka and I will remain here, to continue the illusion that you remain on Besaid. You need to rest and recover from a brief 'illness' after all which necessitated the healer visiting you at home. The Al-Bhed airship can take you to Guadosalam and back again faster than any other transport. I'm sure Cid will be obliging."  
  
Yuna felt like saying that she didn't want to put Cid out by asking to use his people's only major form of transportation, not to mention the temporary home to many Al-Bhed refugees who hadn't wanted to settle in formerly Yevon-controlled territory, preferring to remain amongst their own kind.   
  
But, she thought, she had done so much for Spira. Was it so dreadful she ask for this one small favour?  
  
Fighting down the thought that she was being selfish, Yuna nodded before she could say anything to refuse Lulu's idea.   
  
She would go to the Farplane. She would face the ghosts that haunted her even after she had banished them from her presence. And then she would decide what would happen next.  
  
- End of Part Six 


	7. A Mirror for the Mind

**  
  
Part Seven: A Mirror for the Mind  
  
**  
  
The Al-Bhed airship was late picking Rikku and her team up from the island where they had been sitting, boredly, for two hours until the craft arrived. They had struck the camp some time earlier, and had resorted to playing counting games with pebbles that the found on the beach in order to pass the time. Rikku had tried to resume her mentally alphabetising fiends. She had this time reached Malboro before giving up in frustration.  
  
By the time that the airship did arrive, all Rikku wanted was to be able to sit with a mug of something hot in her hands, and go to bed dreaming of the nice warm Sanubia desert. She made a mental note to tell her father that if he tried to build Home in the polar regions, she would run away and become a nun for whatever remained of Yevon.  
  
Cid found her as she was in the room where they were storing equipment, trying to extricate herself from the complicating straps and layers that made up cold-weather gear, feeling uncomfortably hot wearing it in the temperatures of the airship and distinctly damp as her sweat soaked into the garments.  
  
She had just pulled off her gloves when he arrived in front of her, looking at her expectantly.  
  
"What?" she said, around a mouthful of glove, having gripped them in her teeth in order to pull them off.  
  
Cid wordlessly extended the missive for her to read. Rikku took it, sticking her gloves under one arm, trying to fold out the creases that the paper had sustained after being held by several people. The handwriting was messy and barely legible, but Rikku, used to her brother's hand, could read it well enough.  
  
"Guadosalam?" Rikku looked up from the paper at her father, frowning slightly. "Why does she want to go there?"  
  
"How should I know?" Cid snapped. Rikku guessed that he wasn't feeling very agreeable after the absolute derth of suitable locations that the Al-Bhed had uncovered. "But we'll take her. We have to pass through anyway."  
  
Rikku tried not to smile. "I'll go with her," she said firmly, refolding the copied-out message and dropping it into a pouch by her side. "She needs a Guardian to protect her if Wakka and Lulu aren't coming along. If she's sneaking around, then she obviously doesn't want to be bothered by people."  
  
Cid snorted. "And a little thing like you'll protect her?"  
  
Rikku knew he was teasing, being fully aware of her skills in battle, and having let her roam free on Spira to help her cousin. "I was taught by the best," she said, pointedly.  
  
"Auron? Guy was dead."  
  
Rikku glowered at him. "Vydran, don't you dare say anything mean about Auron!"  
  
Cid shook his head. "Wouldn't think of it," he said, gruffly, and Rikku wasn't entirely sure whether he was being sarcastic or not. "We're going to be in Besaid in a few hours." He glanced her up and down, eyeing her thermal clothing. "Might want to dress appropriately."  
  
Rikku huffed, and threw her gloves into a nearby bin.  
  
**  
  
Rikku had thrown her arms around Yuna and given her cousin a huge hug upon seeing her standing there nervously on the jetty on Besaid Island, flanked by Wakka and Lulu, the former looking a little tired. Rikku had started babbling happily to Yuna about what she had been up to since they had last parted, before Lulu had hurried them aboard the airship. It had been the dead of night, and Rikku was a little confused about why Yuna was so eager to get away unseen, but when Yuna passed some of the time in transit to Guadosalam telling her about the near constant visits she had been receiving, she nodded in understanding and then pulled a face.  
  
"You just saved them all, Yunie. You think they'd let you have a little rest."  
  
Yuna had just gripped her cousin's hand and smiled. "We all saved Spira, all of us."  
  
Rikku had giggled lightly and told her not to say that to Brother, or they'd never hear the end of it.  
  
"So," she eventually asked, "Why are you going to Guadosalam? The Farplane?" Yuna nodded. "To see who?"  
  
Yuna just sighed sadly, and Rikku was surprised as she rested her head on Rikku's shoulder. "I think I just need to see." She said, and would expand no more upon that.  
  
**  
  
Yuna stood at the entrance to the Farplane, staring at the oil-on-water colourings that shaded the entrance, seeming to create a barrier that was only an optical illusion for the living, but very real for the dead. Just behind her stood Rikku, eyeing the geometric portal that hid the entrance with distrust. Yuna focused on breathing slowly and evenly in an attempt to quell the rising sense of panic she felt. As much as she feared seeing /him/ there, the one she had come to see, perhaps the greater fear was that he wouldn't be there, and he had managed to cheat death once again.  
  
"Yunie?" Rikku was shifting from foot to foot behind her, obviously having picked up on her cousin's retinence. "Do you want me to go in with you?"  
  
Surprised, Yuna turned to stare at the young Al-Bhed. "I thought you didn't like the Farplane," she asked, quizzically.  
  
"I don't!" Rikku said, hastily. "I just... thought you might need a little support is all. And isn't that my job?"  
  
Yuna smiled, knowing what the offer had cost her friend. "It's alright, Rikku. You're not my Guardian anymore. And I'll be fine. Nothing on the Farplane can hurt me."  
  
Rikku's mouth twisted slightly. "Sure about that?" she asked.  
  
Yuna knew that Rikku did not fear for her physical safety.  
  
She gave her cousin an encouraging smile, and stepped through the barrier, feeling as if she had stepped through a film of silk that slipped over her skin with ease even as it tried to cling to it. She closed her eyes as she walked. It was too disorientating to move from the world of the living to the realm of the dead to do otherwise. It was easier for her, as a Summoner, but she always felt a slight turning of her stomach as she stepped through, and felt the pyreflies shifting and keening in reaction to the entrance of a stranger into their realm.  
  
Though, she reflected in amusement, she had probably sent half of the pyreflies that floated in the air currents, after they had burst apart in the wake of Sin's demise. She picked up her skirts and ascended the steps to the platform.  
  
She wasn't quite sure why she expected to be alone; perhaps it was more the case that she wished to be alone. There were others there, staring out into what looked to be empty space before one approached and realised they stood face to face with some person from their past. There were two middle-aged women, a young Guado male, and a child, barely able to ascend the steps, by the looks of her, staring watery-eyed at two people Yuna assumed were her parents.  
  
She turned away, leaving the child to herself. She picked a spot on the platform reasonably far away from anyone else, so that she could ignore them as she called upon the pyreflies.  
  
Yuna swallowed fearfully, closing her eyes. This was the moment she had been dreading. She tried to breathe calmly as she had before stepping into the Farplane, but found that she couldn't achieve the same level of inner peace as she had before. Her nerves were frayed, playing havoc with her and she could few her stomach twist in a new direction every few seconds.  
  
Carefully, she built a picture in her mind, of a man she had seen for the last time only hazily, lost, as she had been, in the Sending and so not very aware of much outside of the world of the dead and the pyreflies which had keened their song to her so loudly it felt as if they were screaming. It was that way with every Sending. When she thought she could see him clearly in her own mind, she heistated, before sternly telling herself not to be afraid of Farplane spirits.   
  
She opened her eyes to look straight into those of Seymour Guado.  
  
She couldn't stop herself from taking half a step backwards before her intellect reasserted control over her instincts. Seymour's body was hazy, washed out, and indistinct in form. Pyreflies wended their way around and through him. His face held none of the hunger that Yuna remembered seeing so often in him, instead wearing a visage of abstract calm.  
  
Yuna found that she could breathe again. Seymour hadn't found a way to continue lingering in the world of the living, and had taken his place on the Farplane. She had sent him successfully, though she told herself not to doubt her abilities, there had been that nagging doubt.  
  
Yuna, despite her mixed feelings for the man, couldn't help but wonder if he was happy. Was he rejoicing at being with his mother again? Was he at peace? He had seemed oddly resigned when Yuna had sent him; she had felt that as his body had dispersed and his spirit fled.   
  
In spite of the horrible things he had done, and what he had tried to become, Yuna pitied him and suspected she always would.  
  
The was some whispering from the pair of women on the far side of the platform. Perhaps they were unaware of the peculiar acoustics of the Farplane, or perhaps some attribute of the pyreflies caused them to carry the women's mutterings to Yuna's ears, but she could clearly hear them as if she had been standing beside them.  
  
"That's the High Summoner, I tell you! Oh, she looks as pretty as she did on all those sphere recordings."  
  
"I got some of those. Something to give to the grandkids, I say."  
  
"Who's that she was talking to? Her father?"  
  
"Oh my, you know who I think that is? It's Maester Seymour!"  
  
"Her husband? Oh, I saw that wedding. Went all the way to Bevelle when I heard the tidings. I want a dress like her's for my daughter."  
  
"You know, there were rumours going around. That he did something terrible in Bevelle and to the Ronso."  
  
"Don't be silly! He was a Maester! Besides, would she be visiting now, would she have even married him if he was as horrible as those dreadful rumours make out? Honestly, you shouldn't believe everything you hear."  
  
And that, Yuna reflected sadly, probably summed up most of Spira's thoughts regarding the late Guado Maester. She wondered if the truth would ever come out. Perhaps Maechen would tell them all, as he collected Spira's history.  
  
"I..." For the first time, she sought to address the apparition before her. "I hope you're happy."  
  
Maybe it was her imagination, but suddenly it seemed as if Seymour were staring deep into her soul, and it made her feel desperately uncomfortable.  
  
"I could be happier," she said thoughtfully, "I don't know how to be a mother. I don't have a guide for that."  
  
A flicker in the corner of her eye made her turn her head, and she could see her father and mother hovering there in the space above the Farplane. If she unfocussed her eyes, Yuna imagined she could see Sirs Auron and Jecht in the ether somewhere behind them. She closed her eyes sadly and turned away.  
  
"I wish that you hadn't left me," she told them, and by the time she reopened them, the pair had disappeared.  
  
She turned back to Seymour, staring at him thoughtfully. "And I'm not sure that I should be glad you did."  
  
She started to leave.  
  
The pitch of the pyreflies' song changed suddenly and slightly, imperceptibly perhaps to anyone save a Summoner. It seemed to carry an almost wistful, longing overtone. Yuna didn't turn around, afraid to see who was there. There was one person she thought of with longing now, and if she turned and saw him on the Farplane, it would crush all hopes for her to find him one day. She would rather live in ignorant hope than forever in knowing that she could never hold him again.  
  
**  
  
Rikku was sitting in the same spot Yuna had left her in when she had entered the Farplane, only now her cousin was staring at the rainbow swirled barrier between the realms of the living and the dead with something akin to curiosity in her eyes. It was of a fearful sort, though, and Yuna found she couldn't ignore it.  
  
Yuna touched Rikku's arm to get her attention. "I won't think any less of you if you choose to go inside," she said, gently.  
  
Rikku turned her head and blinked dazedly up at Yuna, as if she had forgotten that the other girl was there. "No thanks." Her attmpts at her usual cheeriness seemed hollow, somehow.  
  
Yuna would normally have accepted, but something nagged at her. "Are you sure?"  
  
Rikku smiled a bit easier this time, but Yuna wasn't sure how much of it was down to good acting. "I'm sure," she said firmly, and got to her feet, starting down the path back to Guadosalam.   
  
Unable to argue with that, Yuna simply followed her. Though she couldn't help but wonder who it was that Rikku thought she might see on the Farplane.  
  
**  
  
Yuna was walking a little way ahead of Rikku, but the girl wasn't especially worried. They weren't in any danger here. The Guado had never been violent towards them, even when they had been labelled as traitors, and since arriving Yuna had been treated with almost ridiculous levels of reverence with her new status of High Summoner.  
  
A Guado male was walking towards the Farplane, his eyes flicking around nervously as he traversed the path almost hurriedly. Rikku tried not to smile. The Farplane tended to be unnerving on the first visit. Rikku had become somewhat accustomed to the sensation that there were people watching you all the time, and the feeling of hearing whispering just beyond hearing, but it was still very disconcerting. Maybe this one had never been here before.  
  
At which point, he walked into her, glancing around so much he had forgotten to take heed of the person he had been walking straight towards.  
  
Rikku was all smiles and apologies as she crouched down to help the young Guado with his dropped possessions. He wouldn't meet her eyes as he fumbled amongst them, trying to get them into some semblence of order. "Oh, I'm sorry! I didn't see you there-"  
  
She froze as he finally looked up from the dusty floor and into her eyes, and she saw the depth of the hatred that dwelt there, so close to the surface. His teeth were bared, and there was a malice in his expression that told Rikku to flee, but she didn't, transfixed by the sight. The Guado, agressive and threatening, reminded her of so many fiends she'd had to face, but there was one difference she saw which she had never glimpsed in fiends: purpose.  
  
"Heathen!" he growled.  
  
She didn't see him produce the knife, but she certainly felt it. Not the moment when he plunged it into her abdomen, puncturing skin and muscle as easy as if he was cutting meat to cook. There was a curious unreality to the situation, and she could only make a small choked gasp, and the bizarre thought that he 'wasn't supposed to do that'. The pain made itself felt as he pulled upwards, forcing the blade through organs until the metal grated against her ribs. Blood flowed freely from the wound, a curiously warm sensation.  
  
It was like no pain she'd felt before. She'd been raked and clawed by fiends, brought back from the very brink of death by battle magics, and was no stranger to injury and pain in battle. But perhaps the worst of the pain, the burning that ran through her, came from the knowledge that when she had looked into his eyes, she had seen a hatred for no other reason than for hatred's sake. Fiends hated the living and attacked indiscriminately. But her Guado assailant hated /her/, and hurt her because of that.  
  
As he yanked the knife out of her, she distantly heard a scream, and wondered if it was her or some passerby on the road to and from the Farplane that had seen the situation. She brought her hands to her abdomen, feeling the thick fluid coating her fingers and tasting the distinctive metallic tang on the air. She felt so very heavy that she found her limbs had trouble supporting her as she slumped to the ground, trying to clutch at her stomach, still unconsciously attempting to stop the bleeding.  
  
Perhaps, if she had been more coherent, she would have wondered what had happened to Yuna.  
  
**  
  
There had only been three times in Rikku's life where she was absolutely certain she was going to die. Even facing Sin, she had been surrounded by people who were her friends and had become almost as close as family, with powerful weapons and the knowledge that they had to succeed to support her. She had not feared death then.   
  
The second time was when she had been sitting underwater in a claustrophia-inducing machina, aging and clanking, and the cockpit barely large enough to allow her to move the controls, she had realised that the two Guardians who had followed her after she had secured her cousin might have just caused her death. Blunt force impacts and great slashes at the hull had caused too much internal damage, and she could hear the sound of the pressure seals cracking.  
  
She had tried to desperately use the eject system that her brother had forced to memorise, for just such an eventuality. But that system was as old as the rest of the machina vessel. It hadn't worked, and the creaking and straining had only become louder and more distressing as the craft sunk further below the surface of the Moonflow.  
  
Then the cracks in the hull had given way, water pushing its way into the inner hull and eventually breaching the pressure seals and spraying her with powerful gushes of water. With the eject system broken, there was one other way for her to escape. But it was a hatch that opened outards, and so the internal pressure had to be the same as the external for her to even be able to open it. That meant allowing the cockpit to fill with water. And at the rate the craft was sinking, that might not happen until she was practically at the bottom of the Moonflow.  
  
Rikku knew she was an excellant swimmer. Her father had insisted she train with the Al-Bhed Psyches, learning from them the 'trick' which allowed them to stay underwater for so long periods of time even while exerting themselves. She had been a natural it seemed, and she quickly learned to match them for their stamina. But there was so little oxygen in the craft already, and Rikku would have to extricate herself from the cramped and awkward position she was seated in before swimming all the way to the surface, even while she ascended slowly, so as not to make herself sick. She wasn't sure she would be able to do that. The cold of the water felt like it was draining her life away, and she had momentarily wondered if saying some sort of prayer for her loved ones would be in order.  
  
Finally, she had settled on, "Father, I'm sorry for failing," not knowing quite what else she could say.  
  
In the end, it was possibly luck that saved her. As the water level was approaching her chin, the craft jolted and crunched. She knew that the impact had likely increased the damage of the ship and let water in faster, but it meant that the craft was now resting on an outcropping of the city lost beneath the currents of the Moonflow. As the water level rose to the point where there was no air left, and she could open the hatch, she found herself much closer to the surface than she had thought. Still, by the time she crawled, hacking and coughing to collapse on the banks of the Moonflow, she was still disbelieving of the fact that she had actually survived.  
  
The first time she had thought she was going to die was when her brother had accidentally electrocuted her, and left her in the medics' care and in a coma, drug-induced for fear she would start screaming in pain again, for three weeks.  
  
And the third time was when a Guado she didn't know stabbed her for no reason.  
  
**  
  
Pyreflies danced about her, intruding on her vision, and Rikku suddenly wondered if the Al-Bhed had been wrong, and she had indeed gone to the Farplane after dying. She wondered if Yuna had performed the Sending herself, and now she was residing on the Farplane.  
  
Rikku was surprised to find the idea wasn't as bad as she had thought it would be. Was it so terrible to spend eternity in an ethereal dimension, surrounded by the essence of those you had once loved?  
  
And then she realised why she felt like a gutted fish.  
  
Rikku whimpered softly in pain and tried to roll onto her side, the fact that she was still alive becoming very apparent. She was still lying on the road to the Farplane, and pyreflies drifted on the air currents lazily, passing through walls and floors indiscriminately. She was rather disconcerted to feel a warm tickling sensation as one moved upwards from the floor beneath her to pass straight through her chest before spiralling away to join a small swarm nearby. She wondered if it was anyone she knew.  
  
A crowd was gathered around her, anxious faces staring down at her, a mixture of Human and Guado, though the majority were of the former. A Human female in the white robes of one who had devoted their lives to healing magic was knelt beside her, and the green glow of healing spells still lingering in the air, along with the fresh scent of evergreens.  
  
The mage smiled kindly down at her, resting a restraining hand on her shoulder. "Oh my! You shouldn't move. Magic can knit skin and bone, but it can't do anything about the blood you've lost. You should be resting, or you'll simply collapse."  
  
Rikku knew she had lost a lot of blood. It still coated her body and clothing, warm and sticky.   
  
"What... happened?" she croaked.  
  
"You were stabbed," said the white mage, with a bright smile.  
  
Rikku would have punched the woman if she'd had the strength. "I gathered," she said, wryly. "What happened to the man who attacked me?"  
  
It was a Guado who spoke this time. "The criminal who would harm a Guardian of the High Summoner fled, like the coward he undoubtedly is. He ran into the Thunder Plains, and there are soldiers giving chase now."  
  
"High Summoner," Rikku repeated dumbly, wondering why that point was sticking in her mind. She gasped. "Yuna!" She forced herself to sit up, brushing aside the restraining hand of the healer, and looked around frantically.  
  
Yuna was nowhere to be seen.  
  
- End of Part Seven 


	8. Legerdemain

**  
  
Part Eight: Legerdemain  
  
**  
  
Yuna wasn't sure how long she was kept blindfolded and secured. It was some indeterminate period of time, and there were curiously blank spots where she was sure her kidnappers had become tired of her attempts to escape and had simply cast a sleep spell upon her. She shuddered to think what the accumulation of magically induced fatigue in her body was doing to her.  
  
She had been making her way back into Guadosalam proper when she heard her cousin scream, and it was like nothing that Yuna had heard with mortal ears before. But she had heard it in the Sending. It was the scream of a soul clinging to life in the face of its departure from this world. Yuna wondered if it was the proximity to the Farplane that brought memories of the Sendings of Sin's victims, and how their spirits had screamed thusly as they were forced by her dancing to let go, to move on, and how they regretted it.  
  
Yuna nearly broke her ankle, she was sure, she turned so quickly.  
  
She turned in time to see a Guado whose face she couldn't see, pulled the long, wicked knife he held upwards towards Rikku's ribs, and Yuna's heart leaped and she nearly screamed herself. She was without her magic enhancers, without the aides she had developed on the pilgrimage to help her, but she was still a powerful mage, and Yuna wasn't going to simply stand there and allow her friend to be killed.  
  
She flung her arms wide, and called down a thunderbolt. The air darkened as Rikku toppled to the ground, and Yuna thought that she was dead. Even as the thunderbolt struck the Guado, she knew it would fail, and she cursed herself for not chosing a spell such as Flare that would have inflicted so much damage. Instead, the spell was absorbed by the armour that the Guado wore, grounded harmlessly, and she cursed, knowing she should have realised that he would be thus protected for passing through the nearby Thunder Plain. She draw in her breath and preparing to attack once more.  
  
She did scream, then, as someone clapped a hand around her mouth and jerked her backwards, pressing a knife that was, from what she could see of it, not too dissimilar from the one the Guado was holding, to her throat.  
  
"Osmose," murmured a husky voice in her ear, and Yuna cried out hoarsely as she felt her strength seep away into the one who held her, and she sagged in his arms.  
  
The sound of the screaming and magic had brought the guards and other pilgrims to the Farplane running, and Yuna's assailant hauled her into a niche in the wall, hiding her from view as these newcomers charged past. Yuna knew they were all focussed on the Al-Bhed lying still as death in the middle of the pathway, her life's blood leaving her, and her assailant who was at that moment pushing his way through the crowd, brandishing his knife at anyone who came too close, and then he fled. Yuna lost sight of him before he turned the final corner of the path.  
  
She started to struggle, and had the satisfaction of hearing a grunt of pain as he elbow connected with something vital, and then she heard that voice utter, "Sleep," in a sonorous tone, and her eyelids had drooped, until she lost consciousness entirely.  
  
And eventually, after awakening and being forced to slumber in the same manner for however long it was, Yuna found herself being marched, blindfolded, along something whose floors were covered in thick plush carpet that muffled the sound of her own footsteps and what she thought were the footsteps of the two guards beside her. She had no way of knowing where she was, she had no idea how long it had taken to transport her to Guadosalam to wherever she was now.  
  
There was the sound of a smooth swish of doorways, so smoothly that they had to be operated by machina. Somewhere Yevon controlled, Yuna decided. Or Al-Bhed. But it was most likely Yevon. Al-Bhed machina was functional, often loud and clunky as it operated, but Yevon's machina, aside from its weaponry, was discrete. The silence of the doors opening was proof of that.  
  
Yuna wondered exactly why Yevon had seen fit to orchestrate her capture, then felt a smile crease her lips. Pointless to ask the question. She would soon find out. She felt a hand on her arm, roughly pushing her in a new direction, presumably through whatever door had just opened. She was manhandled to a stop, and the blindfold removed.   
  
Yuna winced and kept her eyes closed as the light from which she had been kept assaulted them even through her lids. Only when her eyes adapted, and she felt able to deal with their painful reaction to the light, did she open her eyes a crack, and then a sliver, and then she looked about herself with half-lidded eyes.  
  
The room was richly adorned in reds, whites and gold, though it was windowless and contained little furniture aside from a low bed, table and dresser. There were two guards, one on either side of her and warrior monks by the looks of them. One carried a machina weapon, and the other a katana.   
  
Before her stood a woman, her skin thin and papery with age, laid over flesh no longer as firm as it once was, in robes so well tailored for her body that they bespoke her high status and rank within the Yevon church. Her hair was an icy white, bound into a plait that was tying into a neat bun at the crown of her head, and as such she was instantly recognisable.  
  
"I know you," Yuna said, slowly, in a hoarse voice that seemed barely her own. "You were the High Priestess of Bevelle, I saw you at the meeting of the Yevon clergy."  
  
"I am still Ismene, High Priestess of Bevelle, and I will thank you to remember that, Lady Yuna."  
  
Yuna inclined her head gently in apology, though it was more out of the wish to keep the woman who had clearly orchestrated her capture appeased than out of politeness.  
  
Ismene stood, walking around her, looking her up and down and Yuna felt uncomfortably akin to an animal at a farmer's fair. But she endured the scrutiny silently, glaring at the woman when she stopped before her again.  
  
"Are you well? I trust that you were not harmed by those I sent to retreive you?"  
  
Yuna couldn't deny, she felt rather groggy, as if she had overslept heavily, awakening suddenly from an all-too deep sleep. Not that she would admit this, so she simply shook her head. Ismene smiled thinly.  
  
"Good, I would not have it said that Yevon are brutish."  
  
"No," Yuna said, "It has only lied to the people for a millenium, holding a requirement that Summoners die in order to perpetuate death. But no, not brutish."  
  
Ismene didn't look like she appreciated the sentiment. "You speak such words, Summoner, with little to no regard of the harm you cause Spira, that you cause Yevon. Foolish girl. A child who was lucky enough to strike a deathblow at the ancient enemy of the world."  
  
"So why kidnap me?" Yuna asked, turning to follow the woman as she moved. The guards moved with her so that they remained on either side of her body. "If I am just a fortunate child, I am no threat to you, my words are just that: words alone. They are not great armies that I hold in sway, or use to conquer the world."  
  
"Words can do remarkable harm, Summoner Yuna, I would have thought you would have realised that when you gave your speech to the people of Luca."  
  
Yuna's mouth twisted, and though she knew it was childish in a way, she had to speak, to reassert her position, and throw Ismene's own phrasing back at her. "I am still /High/ Summoner, Priestess."  
  
Ismene gave her a sour look in response.  
  
"You are a traitor to Yevon, Summoner," Ismene said, distaste clear in her voice. "The people abandon us, and a thousand years of keeping Spira safe, on your say so. So we have a new task for you now, one you will accept whether you like it or not.   
  
"A task for you, and the child you carry."  
  
Yuna gasped, raising a hand protectively towards her stomach. "How do you know?" she demanded.  
  
Ismene looked at her thoughtfully. "Yevon, even if it is only a shadow of its former glory, still has eyes and ears everywhere. Very little escapes our notice."  
  
Yuna made a note to find the healer from Besaid and make her pay for having revealed such a secret, for she was the only one who could have known.  
  
"What would Yevon want with a baby?" Yuna asked, horrified, recalling Wakka's question, as her mind struggled to comprehend things.  
  
"Many things," Ismene smiled, the expression brittle. "The child of the High Summoner, and of the late Guado Maester. Why, to have such an infant extoling the teachings of Yevon would be wonderful for us."  
  
Yuna stared at the Priestess with astonishment plain on her face. "But such a thing... it would take years!"  
  
Ismene shrugged. "We are willing to wait. In the meantime, it would mean just as much, if not more for the High Summoner and Maester Seymour's wife were to support our cause."  
  
"I will not cooperate."  
  
Ismene's mouth twitched. "We thought as much."  
  
"Seymour Guado, my husband or not, was a delusional man," Yuna continued, unable to bring herself to actively curse his name, even in death. "He believed that by destroying all of Spira, he would end our sorrow. I would not want to say much under the banner of his name if I were you."  
  
The Priestess shrugged. "Well, in a way, he was right. You really don't sorrow much once you're dead."  
  
"As one who has performed the Sending," Yuna said, a little sadly, "I know that is not so. The fiends who haunt Spira are not at peace, and refuse to find it on the Farplane. As did many of the former Maesters who once ruled your halls." She fixed Ismene with a stony gaze. "Are you also Unsent, Priestess?"  
  
Ismene looked like she was thinking about laughing. "I accepted my own death a long time ago, High Summoner. I will not fight the call of the Farplane when my time comes." Then her expression hardened. "But my time has not yet come. So let you put aside your thoughts of Sending me."  
  
"You cannot hold me here," Yuna said.  
  
"And what, praytell, will you do to us? Summon an Aeon? Who shall it be? Bahamut? Valefor? Or did you perhaps inherit your late husband's Aeon, the Dark Aeon, Anima, as the rumours have said?"  
  
"The Aeons," Yuna said quietly, "Are no more."  
  
Ismene wrinkled her nose. "Pity," she said, "I would have liked to have seen it."  
  
Yuna tried not to telegraph her thoughts, as what Auron had once said to her that came to mind. He had spoken the words to her as he and the other Guardians started to teach her the ways of fighting by hand after two separations where they had been unable to protect her. She had protested that she had her magic; her weapons were in her mind and woven in the ether, she said.  
  
'You have your magic to protect you,' he had told her in response. 'But there are times when your magic will fail. And then you must be prepared.'  
  
She silently thanked him, then turned and kicked the guard to her right in the groin.  
  
Not having expected the attack from someone as apparently harmless as Yuna, especially in such a vulnerable area, the guard was somewhat surprised by the attack. He went down quickly, in time for Yuna to duck the swing of the weapon of his counterpart to her left. She straightened and turned in one fluid motion, pushing his weapon to deflect it off course as he whirled back towards her, kicking him in the stomach, before wrenching the machina weapon out of his hands and leaving him without any support to stop his fall to the floor.  
  
Ismene had started to back away, and looked as if she was seriously regretting having only two guards stationed in the room. Yuna ignored the groaning guards, bringing the weapon to bear on the High Priestess.  
  
Ismene looked from the barrel of the weapon to Yuna's face. It was obvious that Yuna was unskilled with the machina weapon, and only the vaguest idea of how to go about using it. But standing barely a foot away from the High Priestess, she didn't even need to be very accurate.  
  
Ismene regarded her calmly. "You would kill me?"  
  
Yuna's grip on the weapon didn't falter. "You wouldn't be the first person I've killed."  
  
Ismene's eyes narrowed faintly, thoughtfully. "No. I suppose I wouldn't be."  
  
Yuna heard the muttering and felt the gathering of strength before she caught sight of the warrior monk she had previously floored clenching his fist and glaring at her out of her corner of her eye.  
  
Yuna hurriedly started running through the spell for a protective shield. It had come to the point where she no longer needed to utter the full chant of a spell in order to enact it, instead she only needed to line it up in her own mind, loosing it quickly and effectively.  
  
The shell snapped into place around her body with a flash of fuschia light that briefly obscured all around her, but the mental effort involved in spellcasting with such low reserves had dulled her reflexes; she tried to duck out of the way of the monk's blade, but the flat of it caught her leg regardless.  
  
He hadn't been aiming to injure her, but the impact was enough to overcome the shell with physical contact. The sleep spell spread quickly through her body, causing her limbs to grow heavy. In front of her Ismene snatched the weapon she'd been holding out of her hands with suprising strength as Yuna collapsed, insensate, on the floor, missing her guardians and her friends more than ever before.  
  
**  
  
"You let them take Yuna?"  
  
Rikku glared at Wakka from where she was gingerly perched on a console seat on the bridge of the Al-Bhed airship. "Yes, Wakka. I did. I even asked if I could be stabbed so that someone could grab Yuna in the confusion."  
  
Wakka looked like he would have continued to rail at the girl, except that Lulu gave him a glare that caused him to fall into a sullen silence.  
  
After having lost Yuna in Guadosalam, Cid, Rikku and the airship had returned to Besaid to break the news that Yuna had been kidnapped. Apparently one of the Guado on the path to the Farplane had seen someone grab the High Summoner, but hadn't been fast enough to summon the guards to stop them.   
  
Rikku was mostly immobilised by bandages around her midsection that were designed to keep her from moving more than anything, though there was a danger of reopening her wounds. Her body had been sealed with magic, but magic could only draw upon the body's existing resources, which had been severely depleted by the attack that had left her bleeding to death on the ground.  
  
"The Guado weren't able to catch up to the kidnappers," Rikku said, fiddling with the end of a bandage that was peeking out underneath her top. "They don't know where they went."  
  
Lulu's lips thinned and Wakka hung his head.  
  
"We should never have let her come alone."  
  
Rikku coughed loudly.  
  
"Sorry," he said, only sounding slightly apologetic.  
  
Rikku turned her attention back to her bandages, and was sure she had managed to hide the fact that she could feel tears beginning to build in her eyes. She had failed, both as a Guardian and a friend. She had failed as someone who had fought for her very life against the worst fiends known to Spira. She had been brought down by a single Guado with a knife, and worse, had allowed Yuna to be taken somewhere they had no knowledge of, by people who could have done anything to her.  
  
Auron would have been ashamed of her.  
  
"We need to find out who told the kidnappers where to find Yuna." Cid said, working through this logically from where he stood by the sphere that occupied the centre of the bridge. They had tried to use it to find Yuna, but whoever had taken from her had sent up false signals over half of the continent. It was impossible to locate Yuna alone.  
  
It had to be someone whose reach spread far, and were organised enough to arrange things so efficiently and so quickly. There were few who met those criteria.  
  
Rikku's lips pressed into a line. "Well it wasn't one of us. And it can't have been anyone on the airship. Any communications in and out of the ship are monitored. I checked."  
  
Wakka shook his head. "Someone in Besaid then."  
  
"But who? We told no one Yuna was going to Guadosalam."  
  
Cid snorted. "Eavesdropping ain't exactly a new skill."  
  
Lulu pursed her lips thoughtfully. "There have been many people seeking Yuna in the last weeks. It could perhaps have been any of them, coming to the hut and lurking around."  
  
"'Cept the women woulda said something, ya? They'd see if a stranger were hanging around suspiciously. Ever since Yevon made trouble in Besaid, they're all really protective of her."  
  
There was a silence, as the pair mulled it over under the watchful green swirled eyes of several Al-Bhed, before Lulu suddenly said,  
  
"The healer."   
  
Wakka look at the mage and nodded slowly. "Yeah. Yuna had to tell her she was going away, ya?"  
  
Lulu nodded, turning it over in her mind and finding that it made sense.  
  
Rikku straightened, frowning both in pain the motion caused her, and at her ignorance in the matter. "Healer?" She echoed. "Was Yunie sick or something?"  
  
Lulu and Wakka exchanged a glance, one that left Lulu with the decision of whether to reveal Yuna's secrets. Lulu narrowed her eyes slightly before turning back to the girl. She had gained Yuna's permission to tell Wakka, but she could not betray her confidence, even if it was to Rikku, one of her Guardians.   
  
"She had merely overexerted herself." Not a lie, but there was a definite omission of information. "She hadn't been eating properly."  
  
Rikku nodded slowly, resettling herself. Lulu and Wakka exchanged another glance, which didn't go unnoticed by Cid, even if it did by his daughter.   
  
"Better go speak to this healer," he instructed, "See if she went and blabbed to anyone, if Yuna told her she was leaving."  
  
Lulu and Wakka, not very much inclined towards arguing with the Al-Bhed leader, stood and started to make their way to the back of the bridge. But Lulu stopped, turning back to Rikku as the girl made as if to follow. "You're staying here."  
  
"What?" Rikku felt a lump form in her throat and tried to speak past it. "But-"  
  
"You're injured," Lulu said, not unkindly, putting her hands on Rikku's shoulders and giving them a faint squeeze. "Stay here and recover. You cannot help us in Besaid, whereas Wakka and I know the village. Get some sleep, Rikku, we'll be back soon."  
  
Rikku watched them go, ignored Brother's pitying looks, and removed herself from the bridge before she began to cry.  
  
**  
  
It was late evening, shading into the depths of night, as Lulu and Wakka walked through the main village on Besaid Island. Yuna had been taken around the middle of the day, Besaid time, and now it was hard to see, the only illumination being the stars and a few fireflies that were attracted to some of the plants of the village. Most had gone to bed, and all they could hear were their steps crunching on the soil.  
  
"Where do we start looking?" Wakka asked in a whisper, even though if he had spoken louder he wouldn't have awoken anyone, since they were a fair distance from most huts, close to the Temple.  
  
Lulu pointed to the Temple. "The healer's quarters are in there." Which made it the logical place to begin a search. Unfortunately, as they approached, they reached a rather insurmountable obstacle to opening the door.  
  
It was locked.  
  
Wakka frowned, pulled on the door to make sure it wasn't just sticking. The doors of the Temple had never been locked in the past. But there had been rumours that in some places, anti-Yevon sentiment had grown so high that they were breaking into Temples and desecrating the Sacred Symbols of the Church's authority, leaving only the statues of the Summoners who had sacrificed themselves untouched. Lulu had put it down to idle gossip, but apparently Yevon were taking it more seriously.  
  
Lulu put a hand on his arm, shaking her head to stop him. "I think she has a windowed chamber," she said, beckoning him around the side of the Temple. "We can at least see if she's here."  
  
It took some checking, and glancing into the rooms of several Acolytes, the High Priest, and a visiting cleric revealed nothing more than sleeping forms. Finally, they reached what Lulu thought had to be the healer's chambers, and standing on a plant pot, she was able to peer inside, and catch sight of the herbs and remedies that littered the chamber. The healer was, on the other hand, no where to be seen, and her bed was neatly made.  
  
Lulu frowned, shaking her head as she lowered herself from standing on the pot. "She might have been called to Isalva or one of the stand-alone huts. Remember, this village is the only one to maintain a permanent healer. The rest shipped out to Kilika after Sin attacked, I think."  
  
Wakka sighed. "So what do we do now? We don't want to go searching round Besaid at night."  
  
Lulu nodded. While the fiends of Besaid weren't very dangerous, or particularly numerous, sometimes they used the cover of night to attack unwary travellers en masse. It was why it was always so important to maintain a watch and travel in groups if one were to pass the night in fiend-infested territories.  
  
Wakka reached up to rub the back of his neck and Lulu didn't realise he was using the motion to hide moving closer until she heard him mutter, "Don't look now. But we're being watched."  
  
Lulu's eyes widened, and she suppressed the instinct to glance around. "Where?"  
  
"Behind you and to your right."  
  
Lulu turned, trying to make the motion look casual, and, with Wakka not too far behind, started walking in that general direction, the hope being to get close enough to see who it was before they realised they had been spotted.  
  
No such luck.  
  
A dark shadow slipped in the spaces between huts, moving away quickly now it realised that Wakka and Lulu had noticed its presence.  
  
"Hey!" Wakka called out.  
  
The shadow let out a yelp, and tried to run for it, only to be halted when a lazy arm gesture from Lulu caused a fire spell to spring up in her path, illuminating her figure briefly. The two Guardians moved in quickly, blocking the female against the side of the seamstress's hut.  
  
"You're Marta, aren't you?" Lulu said, narrowing her eyes at the girl, and didn't need the nod she received in confirmation to know who it was. "What are you doing, sneaking about at night listening to other people's conversations?"  
  
"I heard voices!" Marta protested shakily, her eyes flickering from one to the other. "I thought it might be bandits. Some have attacked Isalva. It's why the Crusaders moved out of here the day before yesterday, remember?"  
  
Lulu ignored the girl's excuse. "And you happened to stay around, lingering to listen, once you discovered whose voices you heard?" The girl wouldn't meet her eyes, and Lulu narrowed her eyes, the irises looking like slits of volcanic rock in her ire. "You've listened to us before, haven't you?"  
  
Marta whimpered, and pressed herself backwards into the hut wall, doubtlessly trying to disappear.  
  
"You told where Yuna was going!" Wakka suddenly said, loudly, and doubtlessly, Lulu thought, rousing half the village. "Who did you tell?" Marta shivered, but when Lulu raised her hand as if to call down another spell upon the girl, she seemed to reconsider her silence.  
  
"I told the Priests," Marta admitted, her words slurred she spoke them so quickly.  
  
The two Guardians exchanged a wordless glance.  
  
Yevon.  
  
"What did you tell them?" Wakka snapped, threateningly. "Huh?"  
  
Marta quailed under the threat of imminent death, tripping over backwards as she stumbled to get away. She landed with an audible thud, but didn't pay any attention to the pain it must have caused her. "I didn't think it would do any harm!" she whispered, terrified. "I thought that the Priests would be so happy to hear of such a thing! Lady Yuna pregnant! It's a marvel."  
  
Lulu grit her teeth, and the smell of ozone filled the air as a thunder spell dropped from above, to scorch a shrub not far from Marta's feet. The girl shrieked and scurried further away from the plant, as if doing so would protect her from further attacks. "I swear! All I said was that she was pregnant and-" Marta bit her lip.  
  
"And?" Wakka prompted, angrily.   
  
"I heard you talking about her going to the Farplane." Marta said, in a barely audible voice.  
  
Wakka bent closer to the girl. "Yuna's been kidnapped, you know? They might have killed her, and it'd all be your fault!"  
  
Marta, unable to take it any more, burst into tears, just preventing herself from collapsing onto the ground with one hand.  
  
Lulu stood implacably above the sobbing girl, her arms folded. "Where is she, Marta?"  
  
Marta shook her head, tears flinging themselves from her cheeks with the motion. "I don't know," she looked up, into Lulu's hard eyes, and flinched. "I swear!"  
  
Lulu sighed and turned away, certain that the girl was telling the truth. She wasn't brave enough to lie in the face of death.  
  
They left Marta sobbing on the ground, neither of them inclined to offer the girl any comfort, their thoughts filled with Yevon, and what they could have done with Yuna.  
  
**  
  
Rikku was standing at the docks, at the end of the gangway that had been extended from the airship to the jetty, awaiting their return. Lulu was gratified to note that someone had given the still-recovering girl a warm woollen wrap to protect her from the night's chill. It would not do to have her succumb to illness when she had only just been brought back from the brink of death. Lulu supposed they had been fortunate that Rikku hadn't followed them out and down to the village. Perhaps Rikku had been more seriously injured than they realised.  
  
"We don't know where Yuna is," Lulu said, as she and Wakka drew close, "But we think that Yevon were the only ones who knew of her location. They must have taken-"  
  
"Wait!"  
  
It was Marta, and she was running up to them across the beach, her heeled boots sinking awkwardly into the sand and held something clutched to her chest. Lulu felt Wakka tense beside her, no doubt wondering as to the girl's motive. By the time that Marta entered range of the lights cast by the airship, it could be seen that she was clutching something that looked little more than an assortment of metal tubes.  
  
"Here," Marta said, dully. Her eyes had lost their spark, and she looked like a girl who had just suffered a terrible blow.  
  
She might have just caused Yuna's death, Lulu thought. As far as she was concerned, the girl had a right to feel guilty.  
  
Marta extended her hands, and in them was held a Summoner's staff, its segments pulled apart and the fans at the head neatly twisted away. The collapsed staff was less than two feet in length, which made it much more transportable. Lulu had seen such an arrangement in Yuna's staffs, but had never been able to understand how her Summoner had been able to reforge the segments into a whole so quickly for battle.  
  
Marta held it out, her eyes downcast. "My father is a Weaponsmith. He made this for me. It is imbued with the speed of Shiva, and eases the burden of the mage." She pressed her lips together. "Please take it for the High Summoner. For I have done such a thing that I can think of no other way I may begin to atone."  
  
Rikku took the staff, while Wakka said, "At least you realise you did wrong."  
  
Marta fled without looking back.  
  
Rikku turned the staff over in her hands, looking at it and asked, "So, Yevon. Bevelle then?"  
  
"Looks that way," said Wakka.  
  
Lulu looked at the group. "I believe any attempt to recover Yuna from Bevelle must be made with more subtlety than our last."  
  
"Yes," Rikku said, mournfully. "After all, we still haven't fixed the cables."  
  
**  
  
"... too many sleep spells... think you overdid it ..."  
  
The voice that drifted through the strange dreams that engulfed her was familiar to Yuna, and she wanted to call out. She couldn't speak, though, her tongue felt too large for her mouth, too heavy and difficult to move. A cool sensation touched her forehead and moved down her cheek.  
  
"... cumulative effect ... foolhardy and dangerous ..."  
  
She wanted to tell them to be quiet, it was disturbing her sleep.  
  
"... help her ... fulfil your task ... release you from your bond ..."  
  
The voices faded, but the cool, soothing feeling remained, gently swiping across her brow. She wanted to thank whoever it was that was responsible, but instead fell into a deep, disturbed slumber.  
  
- End of Part Eight 


	9. Exploration and Inquisitions

**  
  
Part Nine: Exploration and Inquisitions  
  
**  
  
Lulu's scalp itched intolerably.  
  
She fought the uge to scratch with long nails, plain and stripped of their paint. Her hair had been unplaited and rewoven into a simply style, a single bun at the back of the head, held in place with dull wooden pins, and was pulled so tight that Lulu was sure her face would sag when her hair was set free again. She was clad in simple blue garments that any moderately wealthy individual who lived in Bevelle could be found to be wearing, as was Wakka, a matching set to her own. His hair had been forced into a slightly less recognisable style by a matronly Al-Bhed woman who had assisted them in donning their disguises. The woman had clucked over him, and Wakka had been less than amused to learn that she had been comparing him to a cockatoo.  
  
Thus disguised they, together with Rikku, walked the highbridge to Bevelle, intent on entering the city, looking like nothing more than a couple and a Yevonite companion, a relation perhaps, returning to the city after being absent during the exodus from the city during Yevon's lockdown.  
  
Rikku was clad in the garments of a Temple Acolyte, that being the only clothing that had been available that was in Rikku's size and would conceal her bandages that still wound their way about her chest. Wakka had asked where the Al-Bhed had found the garments, and Brother had answered in their language, that Rikku had awkwardly translated, as it quite often being to the advantage of the Al-Bhed to pass for the last person an enemy would expect them to be.  
  
Lulu had refrained from saying how good Rikku looked in them merely to tease the girl.  
  
Perched on her nose, Rikku wore a pair of reflective sunglasses, which hid the green swirls that gave away her status as an Al-Bhed very effectively, and it took Lulu a moment to work out what was so strange about such a logical addition to Rikku's disguise. Then it hit her: they were Auron's glasses. They had broken in half after an encounter with one fiend or another. Auron had a second pair about his person, apparently so self-conscious about his eye that he felt the need to keep it hidden, or at least masked, but as he had been about to discard the broken pair, Rikku had taken them from him and promised to mend them.   
  
Apparently she had kept her word, but not quickly enough to return them to their owner.  
  
The gates to the city were wide open, and though there were two warrior monks standing one on either side of the entryway, they seemed to be in no mood to ascertain whether or not those who passed through had business in the city. They simply ignored the trio, though one roused himself enough to make a half-hearted gesture of reverence towards Rikku, and they passed unhindered onto the main road that ran straight through Bevelle to the palace.  
  
It was in a small square, about a mile inward from the city limits that they paused. The square had the rather attractive name of 'a thousand fountain square', although the actual number present was in fact one. But it was very large, with water spouts gushing fresh liquid into the wide and shallow pool that occupied most of the square. Two bridges crossed the circular pool at right angles to each other, forming a circular platform at the centre, atop which was a short stone plinth. There was hardly anyone there, only a couple of souls braving the morning to pass through on their way to the market or other shops.  
  
"So," Wakka said, looking to Lulu. It had become an unspoken matter amongst them. In the absence of anyone else, Lulu had become the group's de facto leader. "What do we do now?"  
  
"Yeah. I don't think we can walk into the Temple and ask 'Where's Yuna?'," Rikku said, frowning.  
  
Wakka looked at her in her Yevonite robes and smirked. "You could."  
  
Rikku didn't look impressed. "And how long before they asked about wearing sunglasses indoors, huh?"  
  
Wakka shrugged. "They never asked Sir Auron to take his glasses off."  
  
"Yeah, well," Rikku sniffed faintly. "I'm not a legendary guardian."  
  
Lulu looked at the young girl in amusement. "Yes," she said, kindly, "You are. Hence the reason we are in disguise."  
  
Rikku opened her mouth, but apparently at a loss to come up with a suitable retort, she simply folded her arms and put a sour look on her face.  
  
"Still," Wakka said, turning to Lulu, "She has a point, ya? We can't just ask them where Yuna is. If they took her, they'll know we're onto them."  
  
Lulu tapped her lip thoughtfully, casting her eyes around the area as she 'hmm'ed thoughtfully. It wasn't until she had looked around more than once that she finally realised what it was that had been pulling at her mind.  
  
"I do have an idea," Lulu said, leading them across the square as she explained. "When I was Guardian to Lady Ginnem, she came to Bevelle and was fascinated by it, the largest city to still stand proud against Sin. She wanted to know everything she could about the place." Lulu smiled, faintly, wistfully. "So she explored, and being a good Guardian, I went with her. We wandered all over the city, poking our noses in alleys and passages, investigating side streets and squares." Lulu stopped at her destination, waiting for Wakka and Rikku to join her. "She found something very interesting."  
  
They stood next to a stone plinth, upon which was fastened an etched metal plate. A closer look at the plate would reveal it to be a map, with the twisting turns of the Bevelle streets carefully plotted out and labelled in neat Yevon script.  
  
Lulu pointed to the map. "Lady Ginnem found an old servant's entrance to Bevelle Palace, a tunnel that ran under the streets and into the compound proper. If we want to get inside unseen then that would be the best way."   
  
Lulu's lips quirked slightly. "Of course, there is a slight problem."  
  
There was. The street Lulu had indicated on the map was near enough dead centre of the devastation caused by Sin. Even with all the repair work that had been going on, they would be extremely lucky to find that the tunnel wasn't buried underneath piles of rubble.  
  
Still, it was the only option they had.   
  
**  
  
Rikku trailed slightly behind her companions as they picked their way through the streets of Bevelle. There was the only slight problem in their travels of being unable to tell which way they were going, but Lulu was insistent that if they looked like they knew what they were doing, no one would question their presence. So far, it seemed to be working, and from the way that the streets were becoming dustier, dirtier, and from the fact that more cracks in walls and pavements could be found as they moved on, Rikku guessed that they were slowly approaching the area they wanted to be in.  
  
It was strange to see the destruction, albeit most of it had been cleared away by this point. When Rikku had seen Bevelle last, it had been from a vantage point high above the city, watching as Sin crashed to earth and tore apart buildings and roads alike.  
  
She hadn't even given a thought to the people who had been on the ground. It had been an almost abstract numerical concept to her; numbers of lives lost, of buildings destroyed, of the cost in gil to repair and reconstruct lives. But now she sidestepped a mother and two grimy children, the youngest of whom was perpetually crying, all looking haggard and worn. She passed by a young man, his arm torn away above the elbow, only just repaired thanks to spells and stitchery. In the dust and debris there played a solitary child, his robes dirtied and torn, kicking a ball almost absent-mindedly around the alleyway. Suddenly, it seemed a lot more real.  
  
And here she was, passing through in her pristine robes, her mind focussed on a mission, so removed from these people and their lives.  
  
A vicious part of her soul was glad, in a way. Why should the suffering of the world be limited to the Al-Bhed alone? Why should they be the only ones to lose their home, their friends and families, and be forced to painfully reconstruct their lives, knowing, though, that everything they once had was gone, and could never be replaced. It gave her a feeling of smug satisfaction that rapidly turned her stomach, and she felt physically ill for having thought such things.  
  
Then she reminded herself that Sin had killed all equally. She shouldn't lower herself to Yevon's standards in their opinions of those with who they shared Spira. She wore their robes, but she should not let their sentiments cloak her heart.  
  
So she walked through the ruined streets of Bevelle, and smiled kindly at those who recognised the robes of Yevonite, and bowed to her. She wouldn't destroy their illusions for the sake of a bow, even if she could not bring herself to return it.  
  
And then a woman, old and weathered, stepped in front of her, bringing Rikku up short. She wondered, for a heart-stopping second, if she had been identified as a fake, and Al-Bhed. She wondered if the woman was confronting her, and delaying her until the warrior monks arrived.  
  
It was, she found, nothing of the sort.  
  
"Oh! Priestess!" The old woman made a gesture of obeisance.   
  
"I have a son who was killed when Sin fell from the sky," the old woman said, wringing her hands anxiously, "And no one knows if he is one of the Sent. You will say a prayer for Him in the Temple, won't you, priestess?"  
  
Rikku swallowed back what she wanted to say, her opinions on the Temples and Yevon in general, but she couldn't bring herself to so easily destroy the old woman's hopes and damage her grief. "The blessings of Yevon upon you, grandmother," she says, awkwardly forcing her body into a prayer position. "And upon your son. I will pray."  
  
The relief on the old woman's features only increased Rikku's sense of guilt at having said the words, lying about her own beliefs. And then a younger woman closed in on her, and Rikku found herself mouthing platitudes once more.  
  
**  
  
For all that it had been what felt like a lifetime (Lady Ginnem's lifetime, perhaps) since Lulu had walked the back streets of Bevelle, she was rather pleased by the progress their group was making through the streets. They seemed to be finding their way easily through the roads to the devastated area that Sin had landed atop of. Lulu did her best to ignore what she saw as they progressed. She was hardly a stranger to the sorrow Sin left behind in its wake, after all.  
  
But no more, she thought with satisfaction, and the idea gave her step a determined spring.  
  
Lulu turned her head to call out to Rikku to keep up, only to spy that the Al-Bhed had been accosted by a few devout Yevonites seeking what was presumably spiritual guidance. To her credit, Rikku was playing along, offering them was comfort she could, and Lulu's estimation of the girl's compassion went up a notch. She called Wakka to a halt and they settled against a wall to wait for the girl to extricate herself.  
  
"What're you thinking?" Wakka said, after spending a good few minutes looking at her in concern over her distant expression.  
  
"Yuna," She answered, almost idly. As if she could think about anything else, as if she could worry about anything else. It wasn't just her job that made her worry. If it was only her guardianship which caused her to hold allegiance to Yuna, their bond would have broken with Sin's death, and Lulu would hardly feel obligated to go after the girl now. But Yuna was family, and so there was hardly any decision to be made.  
  
"We'll find her, ya," Wakka said, shifting against the wall beside her. "You know we will. Ain't nothing can keep us from helping Yuna."  
  
"I admire your optimism," Lulu said, trying, and failing, to smile at the sentiment. "Even if I don't share it."  
  
"You're the black mage," Wakka said, teasingly. "You don't get optimistic. You get mad and burn things."  
  
Lulu did laugh at that, and felt an odd longing for her dolls, her magic enhancers. She'd like to burn her way through Bevelle's ranks until she got some answers, though it could be argued that her approach lacked subtlety, as Yuna had once reminded her.  
  
And thinking of the girl's smiling face as she had said that to Lulu caused the smile to become hollow, to falter, and to finally fall away.  
  
"I thought it was over, Wakka," she said, reaching up a hand to smooth over her face, as if such an act could erase the bags she knew lurked beneath her eyes, or the tiredness she felt. "I thought now Sin was gone we wouldn't have to worry about anything, about Yuna dying..." She closed her eyes and shook her head. "I was a fool."  
  
"Not a fool," Wakka said firmly, looping an arm about her shoulders. Lulu leaned into the half-embrace. "We all thought that, ya? And it's still going to be that way. This is just a little bump on the road, ya know?"  
  
Lulu smiled faintly. "I wish I could believe that," she said, quietly. "But I still fear for Yuna. Hybrid births are... dangerous. Even if she carries to term... I fear for her. This is even if she does not die at someone else's hands before then."  
  
Wakka just hugged her, and tried to provide reassurance in his presence that he could not in his words.  
  
It was sometime later that the scrabbling of footsteps caught Lulu's attention, and she raised her head from where it had rested on Wakka's shoulder to look over to where the sound was coming from.  
  
Rikku had finally managed to remove herself from the centre of the group of devotees, making her way towards them cautiously, glancing about her as if wary for another ambush of fervant religious sentiment. Lulu didn't smirk as she got to her feet, leaving Wakka's comforting arms behind. Rikku's look was chilled, and thoughtful. She thought it best not to disturb whatever thought processes the girl was going through, merely gesturing for her to follow as they began their journey again.  
  
And so she turned, and walked straight into Maroda.  
  
**  
  
Maroda looked rather amused at the shocked expression that crossed Lulu's face as she jumped back, after having physically walked straight into the man. Wakka looked rather affronted, and Rikku could only wonder where he'd come from, as she hadn't seen him approach.  
  
"Ah, Ladies Lulu and Rikku, and Sir Wakka," Maroda offered a sketchy bow to them in greeting. "I was rather surprised to find that you'd graced Bevelle with your presences." His eyes raked across Rikku's form, taking in her most unusual attired. "Especially garbed in such a manner as one might think you didn't want to be found."  
  
"How did you know we were here?" Rikku demanded, balling her fists unseen within the copious sleeves of a Yevonite's gown.   
  
Maroda smirked, looking over Rikku's shoulder. "You're not terribly good at being stealthy, I'm afraid," He said.  
  
Rikku jumped in surprise. Behind her stood the child she'd seen playing in the dirt, holding in his hands a partially deflated and greyed ball. Behind her stood Pacce.   
  
"Hello, Miss Rikku," he said, with a toothy grin.  
  
She just smiled back uncertainly at him, somewhat at a loss for words.  
  
"We're looking for Yuna," Lulu said, staring at Maroda with a piercing glint in her eye. "Do you know where she is?"  
  
Maroda looked taken aback, as if of all the possible reasons he could have thought for finding them within the city walls thus attired, that wasn't one of them. "No," he said, after a moment's thought. "Yuna isn't in the city, and I don't think she has been since she left the council of the clergy."  
  
None of the guardian's glanced at each other, but Rikku could feel the disappointment in the air almost tangibly. Maroda seemed to pick up on it.  
  
"Come to our home," he said to them, "And I'll see what I can do to explain things."  
  
**  
  
The quarters which Maroda and Pacce occupied were in a reasonably well-to-do area of the city, just between the barracks and the palace's accomodation, presumably so they could be in contact with both at any one time with equal ease. Maroda and Pacce pulled out chairs for them, offered damp cloths to wipe the worst of the grime from their skin, and when they were comfortable, sat down to listen to the trio's story. They explained the situation and while Maroda was sympathetic, he could not help.   
  
"Lady Yuna has not entered the city," he said, shaking his head as he poured tea for the guardians. Rikku was too busy taking off her headdress and shook her head in refusal, though Wakka and Lulu both accepted a cup. "While the guards at the gate might seem lax, we do keep sphere recordings of all those who come in and out of the city. It's how we knew you were here after all. I was rather curious as to why the guardians of the Lady High Summoner were sneaking around like theives, though it seems I have my answer."  
  
Maroda leaned back in his chair. "As guardians of Bevelle, my brother and I keep watch on all the ways in and out of the city. I promise you that Lady Yuna has not walked in through the door recently, and with the debris around Bevelle still to be cleaned up, no ships have been able to approach without being sunk." His mouth twisted into a wry smile. "I'm sorry that I cannot help you, but it seems that Lady Yuna is not here."  
  
Lulu's sigh was heartfelt, Rikku fidgeted with the headdress in her hands, and Wakka looked like he wanted to hit something. Maroda shook his head, repeating, "I am sorry."  
  
"But if Yuna's missing, maybe..." It was Pacce, and he fell silent at Maroda's sharp look, staring down at his hands.   
  
"What?" Rikku said, looking at Maroda with narrowed eyes. "What was he going to say?"  
  
Pacce, it seemed, didn't want to wait for his brother's permission. "It's Isaaru!" He exclaimed, practically jumping off his chair in his anxiety. "We don't know where he's gone, and it was only a week ago, not long before Lady Yuna disappeared. Maybe... maybe they're connected."  
  
Maroda was glaring at his brother in disapproval. He hadn't wanted anyone to know that Isaaru was missing, Lulu realised.  
  
"Do you know what happened?" Lulu asked.  
  
"He just vanished one morning," Pacce said quietly, looking up at the three guardians with wide eyes. "We woke up and he was gone. We're worried about him."  
  
"The Temple might know," Maroda interrupted, his lips pressed into a line. "We think that they talked to him the night before he disappeared. They haven't said anything at all, to confirm or deny, which is very much a case of an unspoken admittance when it comes to Yevon."  
  
Pacce again, his voice full of worry. "But, Isaaru's... he's not well. I don't want him to be on his own now. He can't be. He needs us!"  
  
Rikku's eyes moved from one brother to the other, her brow furrowed. "I don't understand. What do you mean?"  
  
Maroda and Pacce looked at each other, and, heavily, the former sighed. And so he told them everything.  
  
- End of Part Nine 


	10. One Oath or Another

**  
  
Part Ten: One Oath or Another  
  
**  
  
Coolness touched Yuna's face, easing the faint burning sensation that lingered behind her eyelids. She felt slightly sick and extremely groggy, and vaguely recognised the sensation as that of a rather forcibly imprinted sleep spell.  
  
She murmured, trying to say something to whoever it was that was touching her.  
  
"Lady Yuna?"  
  
She had the vague though that she should fight, but the most she could manage was a weak, kittenish movement of her head. The coolness stopped and, for a moment, she regretted its loss.   
  
She opened her eyed, squinting against the glare of the light, and swallowing against a parched throat. "Isaaru," she slurred.  
  
"Hello again, my lady."  
  
She was sure that she was hardly strong enough to push him away as she tried, but the former Summoner moved away nonetheless. Isaaru folded the cloth he had been daubing against her face, and laid it next to a small ornate bowl filled with water that sat by her bedside.  
  
"You've been asleep for a long time," he said, getting up from where he had been kneeling beside her, picking up the bowl and cloth as he went. "I was rather concerned that the warrior monks had been overzealous in enchanting your slumber, and the magic had started to poison your body, sleep toxins building up." He gave her an amused look she could barely see. "I hear you put up a fair struggle."  
  
Yuna said nothing, simply twitching in an attempt to judge the control she still possessed over her own limbs. In the meantime, Isaaru returned to her side and she felt the warm wash of an esuna spell, smelt the tangy citrus in the air, and felt appreciably better as the magic washed the last vestiges of the battle spell from her system.  
  
She opened her eyes fully, more accustomed to the light now, and stared into the face of the softly spoken brown-haired Summoner who had once tried to kill her.  
  
"I wonder that I should be surprised to see you here," she said throatily, finding her voice a hoarse shadow of its usual self. "Though perhaps I should not be so shocked."  
  
"You have such a low opinion of me," he asked, "That you believe I was an enthusiastic participant in your abduction?"  
  
Yuna stared at him levelly. "Are you?"  
  
He returned her gaze without expression. "No," he said, and Yuna felt unaccountably relieved.  
  
"I did not even know you were here," he continued, "Until they summoned me and my services as a mage trained in the Healing Arts." What went unsaid was that he certainly wasn't any use to Yevon as a Summoner any more.  
  
The last time Yuna had seen Isaaru, he had been 'asked' to protect the city of Bevelle as the frightened Yevon church huddled, terrified, within its walls. They had spoken only briefly when she had arrived from Luca after addressing the people of Spira, and had seen neither sight nor sound of him thereafter. She had assumed that he and his brothers had gone home. She told him as much.  
  
"Maroda and Pacce stayed in Bevelle to help the reconstruction after the devastation that Sin caused." Isaaru fiddled with the cloth, soaking it with fresh water and refilling the bowl from a silver jug that stood on a table nearby. "The church said that they still required my services, and so I came."  
  
Yuna got the distinctive feeling that his presence in this place wasn't entirely of his own volition, though she didn't say anything of it. "Without second thoughts?" she asked.  
  
Isaaru gave her a sidelong look and turned away. She thought for a moment that she had alienated him with her words, but after a few moments, he returned to her side, handing her a plain ceramic bowl which she took from him with a puzzled expression on her face.   
  
"You'll need it in a minute," he said obscurely, as she pressed the cool bowl between her fingers, resting it atop her stomach. Isaaru shook his head, moving her hands so she rested the bowl beside her head.   
  
"I have to tell you," he said, drawing up a thinly padded, but ornate, chair up to the beside, leaning back into its support and resting his elbows on the rests. To Yuna's admittedly hazy vision, he looked tired. "I am rather concerned, for your health that is."  
  
"I've had etheric poisoning before," Yuna said, recalling one or two instances on her pilgrimage, during some of the hardest treks across Spira's lands. Attacked by fiend upon fiend before she had chance to rest and recuperate, she had found herself shivering and sweating when they had finally secured camp, her body coursing with alien magics. Lulu, their black mage, had found herself in such a state far more frequently, being sensitive to such things. "I'll live."  
  
"That's not what I'm talking about," Isaaru said, and he wouldn't look her in the face.  
  
Yuna's breath hitched in her throat. "You know," she said, a statement, not a question, and perhaps an accusation.  
  
Isaaru hesitated, then nodded. "I had to scan you to ascertain your state of health. Noticing your... condition... was not difficult. Nor the usual circumstances surrounding the child." He looked at her then, and there was genuine concern in his eyes. "Hybrid births are difficult," he told her. "Both on the child and the mother. It's not unusual for one or both to die in the process."  
  
Yuna shivered, feeling cold in the warmth of the room. "I have no intention of dying."  
  
Isaaru's mouth twitched. "If it were anyone but you saying that, my lady, I might doubt them. But still, there is a reason for my presence here. And that is to see to your health."  
  
"For as long as Yevon needs me healthy?"  
  
Isaaru looked like he might have answered that, but Yuna's eyes widened as a rush of sweetness coated her tongue in cloying moisture, and she just about grabbed at the bowl Isaaru had handed her in time to prevent herself from expelling her stomach contents all over the bed sheets as her body purged itself of the last of the toxins. Feeling gravely embarrassed, she accepted the cloth and glass of water that Isaaru offered her to wash out her mouth, and slumped back upon the bed, not particularly feeling up to continuing the debate, and so falling silent.  
  
So instead she watched Isaaru as he quietly moved around the room. She watched in fascination as he raised his hands over the basin, fingers twitching rhythmically. It wasn't until she saw the faint glow of blue threads looping over each other that she realised he was spell casting. She chanted, lining up poems and prose in her mind that served as a trigger for her spells, whereas Isaaru literally wove his spells out of the air itself. There was the sound of trickling water, and Isaaru used the water he had conjured to clean the bowl, before returning to her side.  
  
"You should be alright now," he told her, placing a hand upon her forehead to gauge her temperature, nodding approvingly at what he found.   
  
"No I won't," she croaked out, turning her head away and dislodging his hand. "I am still captive. And Yevon plots against myself and my child. I won't be alright until I go home and am free."  
  
There was an awkward silence for a moment. "I'm sure the Priestess has her reasons." Isaaru said, finally, but Yuna could tell that he barely believed what he was saying himself.  
  
She turned back towards him, clutching at the frayed edgings of the blankets that covered her up to her waist. "Help me," she pleaded, forcing herself to calmness in the face of his startled expression. "There's every chance I won't live if I'm forced to stay here. Help me leave this place."  
  
"You ask a lot."  
  
"I ask you to keep to the Healer's Oath that brings you here to see to me," Yuna said, urgently, struggling to raise herself so she could look at him properly. She could only just prop herself up on her elbows. "To keep the living to life, and to spare suffering that is preventable."  
  
Isaaru stared at her for a very long time, and then glanced down at the glass of water in his hands, as if he'd forgotten that he was holding it. He set it down beside her bed. "I have to go," he said, before turning on his heel and striding firmly from the room.  
  
Yuna sunk back into the thick mattress, pulling the blankets up to her chin and closing her eyes.  
  
After a while, she opened her eyes to slits, and glanced around the room. Satisfied that no one was watching her, she rested a hand on her abdomen, stroking the skin slowly, before closing her eyes again and sleeping.  
  
**  
  
"What exactly was the point of leaving Besaid in the first place?"  
  
Rikku's question was shouted as she tried to keep up with the strides of the elder two Guardians as they passed along the waterfall lined pathways on the route to Besaid village. Both Lulu and Wakka had unhappy expressions on their faces, a fact which didn't deter Rikku as she continued talking.  
  
"We have all sorts of gizmos on the ship that could help us look for Yunie. Why are we wasting our time around here?"  
  
"What else do you suggest, Rikku?" Lulu said, sharply, as she stopped in her tracks, turning towards the young Al-Bhed. Rikku nearly ran straight into her, not having expected Lulu to halt. "We have no other avenues to pursue. She's not in Bevelle, and we can't simply scour Spira at random until she's found. She might-" Lulu broke off, before she took a deep breath and continued in a calmer tone. "She might not have the time."  
  
Rikku bit her lip, averting her eyes. The thought that Yuna might be killed by whoever had taken her wasn't one that she particularly wanted to consider. After all they had gone through to save her from Sin, and the Final Summoning, it would be cruel beyond words to lose her to something so mundane as normal Spirans.  
  
Wakka spoke, his voice softer than Lulu's, entreaty in his tone, as if trying to make Rikku see the wisdom in his words. "We know that someone from here passed on the message that Yuna was going to be in Guadosalam. It was probably someone at the Temple, ya? Maybe if we find them, they'll tell us who the kidnappers were. It's a start."  
  
"A good idea. If we don't have any luck, we should travel to Isalva, see if the healer who was seeing to Yuna is there and can be of use."  
  
"Why would the healer be useful?" Rikku asked with a frown.  
  
Lulu opened her mouth, debating about her response, until she was cut off by Wakka's sudden, and loud, "Hey! You!"  
  
Across the square, a girl looked up, spied the Guardians, and started, jumping backwards, clutching her woven reed basket to her chest and looking desperately like she wanted to run. She glanced around helplessly for an escape route as the three came over, boxing her against the side of a hut.   
  
"We'd like to talk to you," Lulu said, folding her arms and glowering at the girl.  
  
Marta went pale, skin whitening underneath her island tan. "I've already told you what I know." Her eyes skittered sideways, checking to see if anyone was approaching. "The seamstress was angry, you know. She overheard us. Now the whole village is mad at me." The girl sounded so devoutely miserable that it almost made one feel sorry for her.  
  
"What a pity," Rikku said, not showing an ounce of that same pity.  
  
"Well, if you'd be so kind as to direct us to those you spoke to," Lulu said, "We'll happily keep out of your way."  
  
"The one I spoke to was Vidrani, an acolyte" Marta said, running a hand nervously over her hair as she rattled off the information. "But he was transferred out of here not long after I told him. I guess it was to Bevelle or something. Or he might have told someone on the ship, I just don't know! Why can't you leave me alone?"  
  
"Because," Lulu said, in a low voice. "The High Summoner of Spira has been kidnapped, she whose Calm through which we pass. And it is your fault this has happened."  
  
"You're not doing very well so far with what I did tell you," Marta said, sourly. "Are you sure you're trying hard enough?"  
  
Wakka made an incoherent sound of annoyance, and looked ready to pitch his blitzball at the girl's head in retaliation.  
  
"The fact that you have just insulted our Guardianship is something I will ignore, for now," Lulu continued in that same dangerous tone. "As long as you're telling us everything."  
  
"For all you know, she wasn't kidnapped," Marta spat, her voice rising with every word. "She probably wanted to get away from you people, who don't know when to leave someone alone!" Her voice ended on a shriek, and she lashed out, catching Rikku in the shoulder and causing the girl to stagger back, giving enough space for her to squeeze through and run. Her sudden push through the gap caused her to drop her basket, and the scraps of Besaid cloth contained within fluttered to the ground, some being caught in updrafts and being carried a fair way across the village. She left this trail in her wake as she fled, disappearing behind the temple to where her home was no doubt located.   
  
Around them, villagers, for who gossip was as essential to life as the fish they ate, were staring at them, muttering and whispering to eat other. There was no doubt the scene had caused quite a stir. What was going on, the villagers no doubt wondered.  
  
Lulu sighed minutely, turning away from the curiosity of the villagers. "We're not doing any good around here. Let's find somewhere to sit and plan what to do next."  
  
She didn't meet much argument from the others, and they started wending their way through the clusters of homes to where Yuna's home sat, nestled amongst a little grove of tall and narrow-leafed trees.  
  
Rikku bit her lip and spoke into the silence between them. "Yuna doesn't have a lot of time, does she?"  
  
Wakka opened his mouth, before closing it again and glancing away, as if not particularly keen on giving the idea any thought. Rikku could understand his feelings, but as she could imagine was what was happening to Yuna wherever she was. It was her fault her cousin had been taken after all.  
  
"There's no way to know," Lulu said, softly, and Rikku could hear the anxiety in the mage's voice. "Which is why we need to find her soon."  
  
"We're not exactly having a lot of luck." Rikku wanted to say something about how they couldn't just keep looking for someone who knew something. They needed to go and hunt Yuna down, and the people who took her. But the fact that false trails had been set up in every direction meant that it was nearly impossible. Even the people in Guadosalam had no luck, those who had been chasing the kidnappers having been struck flash-blind from a series of thunder strikes to close to them. Rikku had no doubt that whoever had kidnapped Yuna had thrown off the pursuit far too easily. "It's not right."  
  
Lulu stopped, and turned to face her. "Rikku-"  
  
"It's not!" The girl stamped her foot in frustration, uncaring for the moment that she was acting like a child. "We go to so much trouble to save Yunie, and then this happens. Why does the world have to be so unfair..." she trailed off miserably.  
  
Wakka reached around, putting and arm around her shoulders and giving her a reassuring hug. "We'll find her, ya? And when we do, we'll make them all sorry they ever went near her."  
  
Lulu made a sharp gesture, and Rikku was about to question it, when she caught sight of Yevon robes, and heard the swish of the acolyte's footsteps as the cloth rustled about his legs, and took the sign for what it was: the indication that they should be silent. The Yevonite didn't even glance at them as he strode forward, almost as if they weren't there. On his way, his shoulder knocked into Rikku, and his hand smacked into her midsection as he almost pushed her to the ground.  
  
Rikku's hands clutched at her stomach, and she groaned in pain, nearly doubling over as the impact jarred the still painful muscles. "Hey!" She snapped out, when she had regained enough breath to do so, "Watch where you're going, you big jerk!"  
  
But the Yevonite was gone out of sight, having disappeared in the narrow gap between two huts and gone before any of the trio could realise his intentions.   
  
"I guess some things never change," muttered Lulu, no doubt thinking in her mind of Yevon attitudes to the Al-Bhed, but when she turned towards Rikku, the girl did not seem upset. Instead she was looking at her cupped hands in surprise.  
  
When Rikku's hands had gone up to clutch at her stomach in reflex at the impact, she had also grabbed onto the cold and smooth object which had been shoved into her hands by the young acolyte who had been so rude. Pulling her hands away, she found that she was holding a small recording sphere. It couldn't contain much information, being only a cheaply available visual recording sphere, but Rikku held the sphere up so they could all see it, and thumbed the activation switch.  
  
Shelinda's nervous, halting voice, floating ethereally through the air about them. "Honoured Guardians," she was saying, "I'm entrusting this to a friend of mine because..." The image of the Yevonite wrung her hands anxiously. "Because what's happening... it's wrong. I need to tell you about Lady Yuna, about what they've done with her... what they're going to do with her..."  
  
**  
  
Aboard the airship, Cid and three Al Bhed engineers were engaged in a detailed diagnostic investigation of certain portions of the engine room which were not entirely in perfect working order. Even after possessing the ship all these weeks, it seemed that there was always more things to be found, and, indeed, more things to be going wrong.  
  
"What about that bit?"  
  
"Nope. That's supposed to be there."  
  
"You sure?"  
  
"Nope."  
  
"Never a damned manual when you need one," Cid groused, wiping hands covered in grease on his trouser legs, though the streaks left were invisible among the rest of the grease there.   
  
"It'd be a thousand years old," one of the engineers said, most of his upper body inserted into a hydraulic assembly as he tried to reach a particularly awkward bolt. "What's to say you could read it?"  
  
"Didn't you know?" Another said, a female tapping a heavy adjustable wrench against her thigh as she smirked in amusement. "Our Cid's omniscient."  
  
Cid stared at her. "What?"  
  
"All-knowing."  
  
He cleared his throat. "Damn straight."  
  
From behind them there came a thud that rattled the grating that wasn't very well attached to the deck. Cid turned in time to see a female technician he'd left on the bridge bend down to pick up a ration bar that she'd apparently dropped in her rapid and heavy descent down the ladder. She brushed at it in an attempt to clean the dirt off it as she approached the Al-Bhed leader.  
  
"Why don't you use the damned intercom? And I told you people to stop sliding down the ladders!"   
  
The tech shrugged unrepentantly. "Broken, but then what isn't. We've lost contact with one of the survey teams we dropped off in the west," As she spoke, she chewed on her snack with a vapid expression on her face. "What do we do?"  
  
Cid folded his arms, scowling in disapproval at the tech as if by sheer force of will he could cower her into summoning up a communication from their missing team. The tech, for her part, remained immovable in the face of Cid's glare, masticating noisily. Finally, the Al Bhed leader sighed. "Redirect team three over to their last known location. Probably a faulty transmitter."  
  
"Sure thing," said the tech, taking another bite and munching on it as she headed back to the bridge to contact the other teams.  
  
- End of Part Ten 


	11. Veiled Comfort

==  
  
Part Eleven: Veiled Comfort 

==  
  
Yuna pawed disinterestedly through the fruit bowl that sat atop the table that occupied one wall of her room, which, in truth, was more a cell, though is was decorated in the manner in which Yevon kept its guests. Plates lay discarded not too far away, the food they held barely touched. The meal had been too rich for Yuna's stomach, unused to anything but simple foods, and her post-poisoning nausea had not yet dissipated.  
  
But the fruit was practically rotten; it had not had any attention from a maid in some time. Typical, Yuna thought, with faint disgust, of Yevon.  
  
She eventually managed to find an edible bunch of grapes, and picked them up, taking them with her as she paced the room. Twelve steps she counted, one by one, pacing from the door (beyond which lay armed guards) all the way to the painting which was a false window. Fifteen steps between the other two walls. She'd had plenty of time to make the measurements. Strange, but she longed for a window. Perhaps she could deceive herself, and feel less claustrophobic, if there were wide open space outside.  
  
Or maybe she could see if there was a way out.  
  
Instead she was left to pace the room, memorising every nook and cranny, finding where the paint had begun to chip and peel, where there were burns in the carpet where the lamps had spat hot, burning oil, and having rearranged the bits and pieces (too light to be used as a weapon, and too sturdy to be broken into sharp shards) that decorated surfaces.  
  
Frustration welled-up within Yuna's chest, but with no outlet for it, she rather viciously plucked a grape, reducing it to pulp between her thumb and forefinger before she finally deemed it ready to be put into her mouth. She found herself idly wishing there was a fiend or three. She felt like hitting something. Instead she just ate another grape.  
  
The doors swung open with a loud creak, and Yuna was rather embarrassed to admit that she jumped, skittering backwards, at the noise. The bunch of grapes was dropped onto the floor, and she didn't bother trying to pick it up again. She was left with a pounding heart, a red-face, and only the vague comfort that she had not actually screamed in fright. She was rather determined not to embarrass herself while in captivity, and reacting so to a door opening would have been unseemly.  
  
"I believe," she said brusquely, trying to regain a little scrap of her dignity. "That it is customary to knock."  
  
The guards who had flung the doors open were unimpressed by her brief lecture in etiquette, splitting up to hold the doors open and give an unobstructed pathway to enter the room for the woman who entered the room now to confront the High Summoner. Ismene was flagged by two guards, not the ones who stood outside Yuna's door, as she could still see them standing warily outside, and lurking behind her, Yuna could see Isaaru, who was studiously avoiding looking at her. She decided to follow suit and proceeded to ignore him.  
  
"Lady Yuna," Ismene greeted, with the air of one whose patience was straining, but not yet snapped.   
  
Yuna bit back an irritated retort about her putting Ismene out. Instead, she simply bowed curteously and answered, "High Priestess."  
  
"I thought we might talk."  
  
Yuna wanted to laugh bitterly. "I have nothing to say to you."  
  
"Then perhaps you will simply listen."  
  
"Do I have a choice?" Yuna, after a long drawn-out moment finally nodded. "Very well then."  
  
Ismene clasped her hands before her and raised an eyebrow. "You know what we must do."  
  
Yuna hesitated, then nodded. One of the guards stepped forward; Yuna refused to look at him. He whispered a spell, barely a whisper on his lips, and Yuna sagged as she suddenly felt tired. The spell had stolen from her the strength she used to cast magic of her own. She knew that after a night's rest, she would recover, but it meant that she could not cast offensive, or defensive, spells that could incapacitate her enemies.   
  
Yuna smoothed out her skirt, taking her seat carefully. Ismene's guards moved to stand on either side of the Priestess. They feared, perhaps, that Yuna would attack Ismene as they sat talking, the only recourse that Yuna had left to her now that she could not spellcast. They need not have worried. Yuna had resigned herself to the futility of such an attempt.  
  
"Perhaps," Ismene began, reasonably, "We have not been communicating properly. I wanted to talk to you, to explain why you're so important."  
  
"Because you certainly did that well in our last conversation."  
  
If Ismene was insulted, she gave no sign. "Perhaps I have been unclear," she began, "And so I have given you an inaccurate representation of our motives in bringing you here."  
  
"You called me a traitor and a child," Yuna said, sharply. "Such words I think are a very accurate representation of you."  
  
Ismene frowned slightly, before shaking her head. "I will not retract their sentiment, though my words were ill-thought. Though perhaps you should think of the turmoil of Yevon, and indeed of all Spira, and perhaps you can forgive me a lapse in civility."  
  
Yuna thought of the fact that Ismene was one of those who were trying to stop Yevon from splitting apart at the seams, thought of the stress that the woman must be under, and then grudgingly nodded. It was hardly forgiveness, but it was enough that they could conduct a conversation with relative grace.  
  
"Also," Ismene said, smoothing away a wrinkle in her sleeve. "You did try to shoot me."  
  
Yuna folded her hands in her lap and tilted her head, answering wordlessly with a 'what do you want' epression.  
  
"We brought you here because you, and your child, are important." Ismene leaned forward earnestly in her seat. "Spira is in chaos, Lady Yuna. Surely you have heard the reports, even in such isolated places as Besaid. With Sin's final defeat, there was a brief honeymoon period. The people were happy, glad for their reprieve. But then the reports started to creep in. Bandits roam the places where fiends do not tread. Rioting has broken out at some of the Temples. When the ice started to thaw in the Macalania region, a group of young people threw themselves into the crevice, believing it to be the end of the world.  
  
"With the threat of the retribution for their sins gone and never to return, by your words alone, Lady Yuna, Spira has reverted to the time which brought about Sin's existence. They sin, they maim and kill. A thousand years did not cure the people of this malady. Spira needs something to believe in, the knowledge that they are answerable to a higher authority. That was Sin, and, more tangibly, the Yevon church. We have been that higher authority for a millennium. Without it, the people feel they are answerable to no one, and so they descend into anarchy, and that anarchy is slowly turning to violence, and can not end well.  
  
"It is in part by you actions, Lady Yuna, that this is so. There's no doubt that several of those in positions of power were corrupt, but it is foolhardy, and insulting, to judge all of us who live and pray within the confines of Yevon's temples to be equally corrupt. Those in power are gone now, but instead of a smooth transition to a new age for Yevon and the people of Spira, the church is abandoned. And so there is no core, no spiritual centre of the world. And after that is gone, what is left?  
  
"You caused this, Lady, and so we need you to help us. I will not stand idly by while Spira tears itself apart. You must help us. You are the wife of a Maester, the High Summoner, and you know your word carries more weight than any other. Speak out in support of the church, appeal to the higher natures of the people. They cannot forget their souls, and the fact that their actions in this world have consequences for their lives on the Farplane. You, I think, do not want that any more than I."  
  
Yuna was silent for a long moment. Several long moments, in fact, though in all the time she kept her thoughts to herself, Ismene did not move. It seemed to the High Summoner that she didn't even blink. "Did you write that yourself," she said, when she finally spoke, "Or did someone else do it for you?"  
  
Ismene leaned back in her chair, crossing her legs as she did so.   
  
Yuna continued speaking. "You kidnapped me! Please do not tell me you are altruistic and caring, and have my best interest at heart."  
  
"I have the best interests of Spira at heart. Something must be sacrificed for the greater good. Your discomfort in exchange for the welfare of all the citizens of this world is a small price to pay, do you not agree?"  
  
"You speak to a Summoner," Yuna said icily. "My death, and the deaths of other Summoners were all in the attempts to stop Sin were in the best interests of Spira. But such sacrifices were not the answer."  
  
"No," Ismene allowed. "But that is the past. Why should we focus on a time of so much pain and death? Spira needs guidance to see it into a new golden age, into your Calm which shall be eternal. Yevon can provide that guidance, if the people will only listen. I do not desire your or your child's death, only your cooperation."  
  
"My child," Yuna said, biting her lip. "You keep mentioning it. What is it to you?"  
  
"A symbol," Ismene said softly. "The child of a half-Guado master and a Human High Summoner. Out of the trappings of the world before Sin's end comes something new, something pure. For the child to be raised up in the sight of Yevon's eye would be a sign to the people that the future does lie with Yevon." Ismene fixed Yuna with a firm look. "And it does, my Lady, or the future will not be a happy one."  
  
"You really believe that, don't you?" Yuna murmured.  
  
Ismene smiled, perhaps the only genuine smile that Yuna would ever see from her. "I'm a Priestess," she said, "Believing is what I do."  
  
Yuna stared at the woman for a long time, trying to judge her, but her fatigue hampered her thought processes, and she finally just shook her head.  
  
"I will do nothing for you. I cannot even leave my room, and thus feel no inclination to help you in any way as a prisoner."  
  
Ismene gestured expansively. "You're free to move about the complex."  
  
Yuna opened her mouth slightly in surprise, before narrowing her eyes. "There were and are armed guards at my door," she pointed out.  
  
"Isaaru has pleaded your case. I'm afraid we cannot permit you to leave the island just yet, but it isn't healthy to keep you locked up while you remain in your condition."  
  
Yuna turned her head to look at Isaaru. The former Summoner was examining the carpet weave with a great deal of interest, and wouldn't look up, so she turned back to Ismene.  
  
"You presume no one is coming to rescue me."  
  
Ismene just smiled, and otherwise ignored the statement.  
  
"I am a patient woman," Ismene said, getting to her feet. "But, Lady Yuna, I would advise that you not take so long. Hybrid births, as you know, are extremely perilous. It would be a shame if there were complications during your delivery that meant decisions were left undecided, and, worse, your child without either parent."  
  
Yuna felt cold, and a nausea that had nothing to do with rich food, or pregnancy. "You... you would kill me and take the child?"  
  
Ismene tilted her head. "Now, Lady Yuna," she said, in the manner of a teacher scolding a foolish child, "We are not in the business of killing people. We have plenty of time til then to take steps to ensure your safety, and the future is never certain."  
  
Yuna, thought, recognised the threat for what it was, however veiled Ismene made it. She stared after the group as Ismene swept out of the room, the guards falling into step behind her. Isaaru looked at her for the first and only time since he had walked into the room behind Ismene. But he couldn't hold her eyes for long, and turned away, following the rest of the group out.  
  
Yuna ran a hand through her hair and sighed, glancing around the once more silent and too-empty room. She picked up her bunch of grapes and started eating them again, for a lack of anything better to do.   
  
"That went well," she said with a sigh, and took another bite. 

=

  
  
The hallways of the complex were always quiet, and even as Ismene and her entourage swept through them, there was hardly a disturbance caused by their passage. Footsteps were muffled by the carpet, and the walls absorbed even words. Two people could hold a conversation in these halls, safe in the knowledge that people only a few meters away would have a hard time hearing it. And it had been designed that way, of course.  
  
"Stubborn," Ismene murmured, as she strode along at the head of the group. "Though she would have to be, to defeat Sin, and so creatively. Such certainty..."  
  
Isaaru might have been the object of her address, but he had decided that Ismene was not looking for a verbal reponse, and so he simply nodded and followed along, half a step behind and to the side of the Priestess.  
  
"Is it true, Isaaru?" Ismene asked suddenly, stopping to look at the ex-Summoner.   
  
Isaaru looked surprised at the unexpected change in conversation, a surprise that wasn't helped by having to halt himself abruptly before he ran into the High Priestess's back. "Is what true, High Priestess?"  
  
"The Maesters, Isaaru. Is it true? Were they Unsent?"  
  
Isaaru opened his mouth to answer, then hesitated, confused for a moment, and cast his memory back to his time spent as the protector of Bevelle, a task he had undertaken at the request of the Maesters. "I... do not know," he finally answered. "Though from reports I have heard it seems likely."  
  
"I see," Ismene said, quietly, after a moment. Then she turned and started walking away. Isaaru didn't need beckoning to follow. He knew that until he was dismissed, Ismene expected him to trail her footsteps like a lost puppy.  
  
"I'll be returning to our headquarters shortly," Ismene said, as if she had never asked such an unusual question, the speed of her passage meaning that Isaaru had to hurry to keep up with her.  
  
"I will be ready to depart within the hour," Isaaru said, bobbing his head.  
  
"No," Ismene raised a hand to dismiss his words. "You'll remain here, and see to Lady Yuna."  
  
This time it was Isaaru's turn to stop abruptly. "But, I thought-"  
  
Ismene slowed to a halt, turning and raising her eyebrows. "You thought?" she prompted.  
  
"This is not my task."  
  
"I disagree," Ismene said smoothly. "There are few better suited to your task. Lady Yuna needs the support of one familiar to her. When she relaxes, and realises that our goals are in Spira's best interest, she will help us. This is your task, Isaaru."  
  
Isaaru didn't answer for a moment, glancing away. He heard Ismene's footsteps as she crossed the thickly carpeted floor to his side, and when she gently touched his face to turn him towards her, he tried to force himself to meet her sympathetic eyes.   
  
"You are so eager for the end of it all?" Ismene asked, gently.   
  
Isaaru found he couldn't answer her, closing his eyes to avoid the Priestess's stare. Ismene drew him closer, resting a hand on the back of his head. "You were a Summoner, a loyal servant of Spira. In the eyes of Yevon, you have atoned. And yet you still think yourself so unworthy?"  
  
"Atonement for a Summoner comes in death," Isaaru said, in a quiet voice. "I do not expect anything else."  
  
"So selfless," Ismene murmured, and stroked his head reassuringly before standing free of him. "I will be leaving for the southernmost island in an hour, and you will remain to see to Lady Yuna. Her child will be very important to us all. This is your task. Do you understand, Isaaru?"  
  
Isaaru nodded slowly. He had given his word that he would not give up until his task was complete, and Ismene had given him a task that might never end. And she knew it. She smiled at him.   
  
"Go and find some food," she advised. "I know for a fact you haven't eaten today, and I will not have you passing out from hunger."  
  
Straightening his sleeves, Isaaru walked away, trying very hard not to think about Lady Yuna and what Ismene was asking of him.  
  
- End of Part Eleven 


	12. Two Weeks Later

  
  
Part Twelve: Two Weeks Later  
  
Isaaru shuffled down the long hallways, hampered from taking long stride through the sheer bulk of his robes. Sometimes he wondered why he still bothered with the garments which, even during his pilgrimage, had restricted movement. But then he'd never been a particularly physical fighter, and had never needed to run fast. Especially not down the long corridors which ran the length and breadth of the complex in which Yuna, and to a lesser extent he, had been interred.  
  
There weren't many people to be seen around, but that wasn't very surprising. The complex was little more than a garrison, decked out in finery for when Maesters of the Yevon church had wanted to gather somewhere private and very safe. So there were soldiers and there was Isaaru. He knew there were two white mages in attendance to the men, but they were little more than battlefield medics and commanded not the wealth f healer knowledge that Isaaru had learned at his father's small clinic in a small town close to Bevelle.   
  
Their proximity to the holy city had seemed to protect had seemed to protect some of the outlying towns, but not enough that Isaaru's mother not had been one of those taken from him by Sin. In retrospect, he wondered why his father had been so shocked in his giving up the healing arts to take up those of the summoner.  
  
Still, it was pointless to dwell on such things. Father was dead, and no amount of retrospect could bring him or any of the dead back to the living. The best he could hope for was that he and the villagers had not become fiends. Isaaru's life seemed to be here now, padding down fine hallways to deal with prisoners.  
  
He dimly realised he should feel sickened at himself.  
  
The guards were now gone from outside Lady Yuna's quarters; Ismene had kept her word and relaxed the restrictions she had placed on the High Summoner's movements.   
  
But still Yuna had not ventured from inside her rooms, apparently content to stay within those four walls, only making human contact when Isaaru came to check up on her, or someone brought her food and drink. It was in order to set this situation to rights that Isaaru took himself to her door and rapped upon it.  
  
At first there was no response. Isaaru thought she might have gone wandering outside but dismissed the thought. Though they were not vidible, there were still eyes watching Yuna, and there were standing orders to report back to Isaaru if anything of note happened. The Lady High Summoner Yuna breaking her confinement would be so worthy of note. So he knocked again.  
  
There was a long pause, then finally a tired 'yes' drifted through the doorway separating them.  
  
"It's Isaaru," he announced. There was no answer. "May I enter?"  
  
Yuna's answering 'yes' sounded more akin to a sigh than permission. But it was permission and so the former Summoner entered to find Yuna knelt on the floor beside her low table, drinking tea out of one of the unbreakable cups that they had carefully made sure was supplied since the guards had become wary of the slight girl's physical capabilities. Isaaru tried not to smirk as he thought of the guard he had treated after he had suffered at the hands of Yuna's less than tender mercies.  
  
Yuna was looking at him, eyebrows raised expectantly. She was waiting for him to speak first.  
  
Isaaru couldn't blame her for not wanting to greet him, but bowed respectfully regardless. "Lady Yuna," he began, "I was wondering if perhaps you would care to join me in a walk about the complex."  
  
Yuna continued to regard him for a long moment, before she raised her cup to her lips to sip demurely from it.  
  
Isaaru pressed his lips together, reminding himself that she had every right not to respond and so that taking offence would be quite presumptious. "While you have had the opportunity to leave your rooms," he said, "You have not availed yourself of that. It is hardly healthy, and as I have been charged with maintaining your wellbeing it is my responsibility to ask such things of you."  
  
Yuna finally spoke. "And if I don't care for your attention?"  
  
Isaaru placidly folded his hands before him. "I have my task."  
  
Yuna quietly drained the last of her tea and stood. "I suppose I could use the fresh air."  
  
Isaaru bowed slightly and stood back to allow her to pass which she did, barely glancing at him. He tried not to sigh as he hurried after her.  
  
"I'm not your enemy," he told her, as he caught up to her and slowed to a walking pace. "You need not treat me as such."  
  
"Then why will you not help me leave?" Yuna asked and her tone seemed dejected rather than angry.  
  
Isaaru wanted to tell her that he needed no one's disappointment, that any failings were his and his alone. But there was no call for it. Instead he lowered his eyes to the carpet and repeated, "I have my task."  
  
She didn't understand, but Isaaru hadn't expected her to, he just wordlessly started steering her in the direction of one of the terraces which led down towards the prayer gardens.  
  
Yuna seemed distracted by the sight of the exterior as they passed thorugh the arched doorways that led to the outside. It wasn't much of a view. The ground was mostly barren, the prayer gardens consisting not of the lush grasses, and blossom trees that could be found all over Bevelle. It was mostly sandy dirt, not far from the foothills of barren mountains that were too low to be adorned with snow. Most of the aesthetic qualities in the garden were from tastefully arranged and shaped rocks and ornaments, with sun-bleached prayers written on the pillars which adorned the pathway that led to the meditation area. But even though the air was dry and warm, to the north could be seen dark clouds and the occasional flash of lightning. The island itself was rather small, all things considered, and had a remarkable lack of ways to arrive and depart; one reason why Ismene was not so bothered about Yuna moving about freely.  
  
"Where are we?" Yuna asked, looking around.  
  
"The western isles," Isaaru answered.  
  
"North of Bikanel?" Yuna asked, to which she received a nod in response. "Over there?" She gestured to the storm.  
  
Isaaru shrugged. "Apparently it's been dissipating for a while, even though it lasted for years before I got here."  
  
"Hmm." Yuna's mouth twisted. "The Fayth is gone."  
  
Isaaru blinked in surprise, turning towards the north and peering carefully, though he was too far away to see past the rocky ridges which decorated the northwest of the island. "I wasn't aware there was a temple there," he said, trying not to feel unnerved at having been a Summoner and not knowing of a Fayth.  
  
"Only the ruins of one. The Fayth there..." Yuna bit her lip, as if trying to determine whether she should say anything, then she sighed. "The Fayth was Seymour's mother."  
  
Isaaru didn't realise he was staring in shock until Yuna glanced at him and smiled, just slightly. "Oh, yes, that's right. You didn't reach Zanarkand."  
  
She probably hadn't intended those words to sound insulting, but Isaaru was stung by them all the same. He had put his pilgrimage on hold to protect the people of Bevelle, something which he had not been given a choice about. The Maesters had threatened and bullied, and interfered with a Summoner's sacred task. It wasn't something that he deserved pity over. But he didn't say anything, just let Yuna continue to speak without any explanation for her words.  
  
"She seemed a nice person," Yuna said, kicking the toe of her boot into the dirt and kicking up a flurry of rust covered particles. "I know that sounds like such a childish thing to say, but she was... 'nice'. I don't know what else I could say. Sad, maybe. Sad that her son had turned out the way he had. But, you know, she didn't help. She became a Fayth, abandoned him. Turned into a creature supposed to be so powerful that he could defeat Sin. I'm trying to decide whether that was ultimate love, or... bad parenting."  
  
Isaaru blinked, then came to a realisation. "You're worried about the relationship you might have with your child?"  
  
"It's not like I had parents to show me how it was supposed to be done," Yuna said. "Even the parent I do remember went and died in a pointless endeavour."  
  
"Defeating Sin was pointless?" Isaaru asked, his head reeling from such a sentiment coming from a Summoner, no less than a High Summoner, even.  
  
"Dying to defeat Sin was pointless."  
  
"Death can have a point," Isaaru said, sharply, then turned his head away, hoping she hadn't detected that sharpness. Fortunately, she seemed to be distracted.  
  
"My father shouldn't have had to die," Yuna whispered fiercely. "All I remember is... is this kind person who tucked me in bed at night and who carried me on his shoulders as he took me to the Temple. I can barely remember what he looks like... just what I've seen on the Farplane and in spheres."  
  
"I'm sorry."  
  
"Don't be," Yuna shook her head, earring bouncing against her shoulder with the motion. "It's not something that's your fault after all. And I followed in my father's footsteps, so perhaps I should not complain so."  
  
"I can certainly sympathise there."  
  
"Your father was a Summoner?"  
  
"A healer," Isaaru said, shaking his head. "Something which my father trained me to be as well, though I think I have not become as good a one as he would have liked."  
  
Yuna shrugged fluidly. "You seem to manage."  
  
"I'd rather still be a Summoner," he told her.  
  
Yuna stopped, and turned to look at her. "Why?"  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Yes, why?"  
  
He stopped, turning to peer at her, trying to see if there was an obvious flaw. Eyes unfocused? Flushed? But no, she seemed perfectly fine. "You don't feel it?" he asked, feeling his voice cracking. No, it couldn't just be /him/.  
  
"Feel what?" Yuna blinked those discordant eyes of hers.  
  
"There's a space," he said, racking his brain to think of a way to say what he wasn't sure that he had words to describe.  
  
He instead tried to think of how it felt to him, and so moved to stand behind Yuna, resting his hands on her shoulders. "Here. They no longer walk behind you, a strength you can't quite touch, a presence that makes you walk with your head a little higher because you know the Fayth are with you."  
  
Yuna might have been trembling, but the ache within Isaaru swelled up, precluding his sensing any distress on her part.  
  
"Such a power, protecting and comforting. They Hymn of the Fayth is like a constant low background hum, and it's all you can do not to join in. You have touched their dreams, and in a way it makes you feel just a bit closer to the perfection they are."  
  
He hadn't even realised that he'd moved closer, perhaps the ache inside him had driven his need for human contact. His hands still rested on her shoulder, but his robed chest touched her back. Her hair smelt of the vaguely medicinal herbal soap that was standard issue to the troops who resided in the barracks.  
  
"You feel i," Isaaru said, his voice low. "Don't you?"  
  
"Yes," Yuna grated out through gritted teeth. "Of course I do, you /idiot/."  
  
At which point she drove an elbow backwards into his solar plexus, and when he let go of her shoulders to clutch at his midsection as he double over, Yuna spun around and, though Isaaru would later be sure it wasn't necessary, she followed up her strike with a resounding open-handed slap to the ear, which was enough to send him reeling, stunned, for a few minutes.  
  
As he collapsed to the ground, groaning, Yuna took of running down the pathway back in the direction of the garrison complex, and Isaaru made the mental note never to smirk at the guards Yuna had beaten up again.

* * *

Yuna wasn't entirely sure where she was intending to go after she had fed from Isaaru. When she had found herself scramblig up he steps into the complex, she found that she was thinking of the familiarity of the rooms that were her prison was a haven more than a hell at that moment.  
  
Isaaru had shaken her badly, she realised as she stumbled through the halls operating on a fuzzy recall of the path that Isaaru had led her through the wending passages.  
  
Bad enough that he had awakened an ache she hadnt even realised was there.  
  
Yes, she missed the Fayth. It seemed a terrible thing to say, to give it such a mild term as 'missed', and also selfish; their rest had been so dearly earned over a thousand years. But in spite of the pain of their parting, she had let them go, watched the bodies of their Aeons dissolve into pyreflies as she danced the Sending. She had said goodbye then.  
  
But Isaaru... had he ever let go?  
  
Perhaps not, she realised.  
  
In her haste, she failed to lift her foot high enough to prevent herself from catching the lip of the two steps which were placed in the archway of an entrance to the residential section, where Yuna had been confined. She stumbled and fell to the floor, fighting the urge to repeat a few unspeakable and blasphemous phrases in order to best express her irritation with herself at being so clumsy. She bit her tongue in a renewed effort to clamp down on that urge as two metal armoured boots came into her field of view.  
  
She looked upwards to see a tall woman guard, in the silver armour and green undertunic of her positon within Yevon, wordlessly offered her hand to help Yuna to her feet. Yuna debated for a moment, before deciding that she should at least be curteous and accepted the hand up. She tried not to jump back in surprised when she realised the guard was holding something, several somethings, that felt hot and sharp all at once, and was pressing it into her hand.  
  
Then the guard smiled and drew her hand away, and Yuna realised what was happening.  
  
The guard turned and stared away, and Yuna opened her palm and stared in surprise at what she was holding. She first thought that it was the trasnferred warmth of the guard's hand she felt in the glassy chips in her palm. Then she realised her mistake. They were fire gems, unusually potent too, if the heat that nearly burnt her fingers, and their brilliant inner glow was anything to go by.  
  
She opened her mouth, turning to call back the guard, but she was gone.  
  
Yuna felt her lips curving into a smile, quite of their own accord. It was no longer a case of 'if' rescue was coming, or even 'when'; they were already here, and so her escape would be following very soon. She clutched the gems to her chest, tightening her fingers around till the burning faceted edges bit into her palm, then she hurried down the hallway towards her quarters to prepare.  
  
- End of Part Twelve 


	13. The Woven Shield

  
  
Part Thirteen: The Woven Shield  
  
There was one reason that Isaaru didn't often leave the garrison complex, apart from the fact that there was very little if anything for him to do outside. It was that the heat, combined with his heavy formal robes, made for one very uncomfortable ex-Summoner. Raised in the Bevelle region's rather temperate climate, he was singularly unsuited for such arid environments as he now had the misfortune to find himself. The lingering soreness from Yuna's well-aimed attack wasn't helping him at all.  
  
But it might have just knocked some sense into him. There was something he couldn't stop thinking about, something about her reaction...  
  
The unlatching of bolts distracted him, forcing him to redirect his attention outside of himself. He stood on the docks that extended outwards in a criss-cross of wooden jetties, waiting as the speedy little craft that Ismene had claimed as her personal transport extended its gang plank to allow the Priestess's entourage disembark.  
  
First came the armoured guards, and Isaaru couldn't help but felt vaguely sorry them. He could just imagine how hot the metal some of them were forced to wear was getting under the glare of the sun, and rather thought that the lesser ranked soldiers, who were not required to don such garments, were feeling very lucky indeed.  
  
And then followed Ismene, looking far more comfortable in her religious robes than she had any right to. Isaaru knew his place, falling into step just behind her and to the right of her, the guards stepping back as he did so, widening the gaps in the ranks so that the two of them could speak with at least the seeming of privacy.  
  
"Well, Isaaru," Ismene said, with the air of one speaking of something amusing. "It seems you will not be too long in your exile here."  
  
"Priestess?"  
  
"The day, Isaaru," Ismene said, gracing him with a smile and prompting his memory with arched eyebrows. "The day of birth is nearly upon us."  
  
It took him a moment to recall what it was she was talking about. "Ah, I see," he said, nodding slowly. "You wish me to return, then, to oversee."  
  
"Of course," said the High Priestess. "I am quickly tiring of Lady Yuna and her most disagreeable nature. I do not intend to give her any more attention, not until her child is born, something which you will also oversee, and then she may have outlived her usefulness."  
  
Isaaru tried not to breath a too-audible sigh of relief as they ducked into the tunnel, the cool of the underground passage closing into to relieve the sweltering heat of the sun. "I don't think I ever intended my role in life to be that of a midwife, but it seems to have become just so."  
  
Ismene actually laughed, the sound like dry leaves rustling together. "If it is so, it is because there is no one better suited for the task."  
  
And also no one who Yevon could browbeat into helping them, Isaaru didn't say, and fell silent a while as he considered the issue that had been lingering at the forefront of his mind for a while.  
  
They climbed the steps that seemed to rise up interminably, until they reached two ornate doors, pushed open by burly guards who held them open while they passed. The sunlight streamed in through the high windows, leaving blurry afterimages on Isaaru's vision as his eyes struggled to adapt to the sudden increase in light.  
  
"If it is not too impertinant, High Priestess, may I ask a question?"  
  
Ismene smiled indulgently at him. "Of course, Isaaru. What is it?"  
  
"Do you..." Isaaru licked his lips in his nervousness. Ismene was liable not to react well to his disagreeing with her plans. "Do you still intend to carry out this course of action? Your supporters in the church are many, but they may not have the stomach-"  
  
"Why, Isaaru," Ismene stopped, coming to face him completely. "Is this a sign of interest where previously there was none? Perhaps Lady Yuna has her uses indeed, if she can give you cause to care for anything again."  
  
"Perhaps I simply needed time to recover," Isaaru said, not liking the way she was looking at him. "Or to consider what you are planning."  
  
Ismene's smile was brittle. "Do you intend to step away from the path? Perhaps seek to 'spread the word'?"  
  
Isaaru swallowed. "Of course not, Priestess."  
  
"Good," Ismene stepped close to him, close enough that he wanted to back away. But he held his ground. "Because I would not want you to think that it would be at all wise to do so. Do you wish Spira to fall to the fighting and warfare that was rife in the time before Sin? Do you wish the people to fall away from the one thing, Yevon, which held them together through their time of strife? The people of Spira are as children, Isaaru, they need guidance. And like children, it must be delivered subtlely."  
  
Ismene drew herself up. "Am I clear?"  
  
Isaaru bowed, low and formally. "Yes, High Priestess Ismene, you have made yourself quite clear."  
  
"Excellant," All trace of harshness gone, Ismene smiled, and swept away down the corridor, leaving Isaaru standing alone.  
  
Making his decision, he headed in the opposite direction.

* * *

"I'll make this brief."  
  
Yuna glanced up from here she had been studiously examining the edge of the rug which covered most of the centre of the room. Her toes just touched the fringed edge of the carpeting. "Please do," she said with a pleasant smile.  
  
Ismene didn't seem to take Yuna's facial expression too well. "Do you find something about this situation amusing, Lady Yuna?"  
  
"This particular situation? Not amusing, no. Gratifying somehow."  
  
"Oh?"  
  
Yuna tilted her head, folding her hands neatly before her. It was a stance she had assumed before countless teachers in times past, as she politely recited the answer to some assigned question. It was, in all truth, partially designed to irritate the woman. Yuna could get little other than cheap shots at her in, although she considered it somewhat beneath her to do so, without her guards deciding to take potshots at /her/. "That still you come, knowing my answer, in the vain hope that it will have changed. How infuriating it must be for you, Priestess, to constantly have to ask for my aid, knowing it cannot be extracted involuntarily. That it the source of my gratification: that you may hold me prisoner and hostage, but really, you do not hold anything of value at all."  
  
"I could have your child," Ismene said, sourly.  
  
Yuna just spread her hands in a 'come and try' gesture.  
  
Ismene ground her teeth together for a moment. "Will you help us?"  
  
"I will not."  
  
"Hmph. Your stubbornness is hardly a becoming trait."  
  
Yuna just smiled, serenely.  
  
"So I, perhaps, have only one thing left to ask you." Ismene narrowed her eyes, glaring belligerently at the High Summoner. "Do have anything to say for yourself?"  
  
Yuna's eyes flickered upwards, contemplating the oil lamps that were perched on the wall on either side of the doorframe. They were unlit, but if anyone were to look it at them in the dark it would quickly become apparent that there was an unmistakeable, if faint, glow about them.  
  
"Not really, except, maybe, goodbye?"  
  
It was not possible for a mage to cast two spells simultaneously. But Yuna was no mere novice, and for the advanced and practiced mage, it was entirely possible to cast spells so quickly in sequence that to an outside observer they may as well have been cast at once.  
  
Which is precisely what Yuna did.  
  
In her head, she lined up the chant as she always did, her haste forcing her to couch the intent into no more than a syllable or so. In truth, words weren't important, it was the intent more than anything which allowed the mage to perform their magic. For white mages, the intent to take pain by purging poison, or for a fire spell, the wish to see things burn.  
  
Like the fire gems she had laid into the oil lamps.  
  
They were already unstable. All they need was a gentle nudge in order to combust. A candle flame would have done it, but Yuna, for all intents and purposes, might as well have encased them in a fireball. The fire gems ignited in a roar that drowned out the sound of their glassy shells cracking. And as soon as they lit, the oil in the lamps burst into flames, the lamps exploding outwards and showering anything within ten feet with hot and flaming oil, sparks catching the other lamps, causing a cascade of minor explosions and finally plunging the room into mostly darkness.  
  
Yuna had the sense to be further than that away from the wall (ten steps she had carefully paced out away from the door), and was completely unsurprised when the explosion had the effect of demolishing most of the doorframe.  
  
Ismene had good guards. The moment the flames had erupted, the two either side of her had jumped on her, pulling her to the floor and covering her until the worst had gone. The moment it was safe to stand, a third guard grabbed the High Priestess, and hauled her away from the chaos, while the rest of the soldiers formed up, brandishing their weapons and starting towards Yuna.  
  
The former Summoner took a deep breath, steading herself. Spellcasting without aides was something she had become far too unaccustomed to, and her pregnancy had a draining effect in and of itself. She took stock of her reserves and began to cast a shield before her. It wouldn't protect her from harm entirely, but it might give her enough of an edge that she could break through the lines and make a run for it.  
  
Then the room darkened, far beyond what destroying the lamps should have done. The silhouettes of the guards, shown by the light of the hallway, faded to mere grey shadows. Then lightning plunged down from above, striking in the dead centre of the ranks, causing Yuna to yelp and raise her hands to cover her eyes from the flash of blue and white light.  
  
She heard two more crashes that signified strikes, and the yelling of guards in pain. By the time she cracked open her eyes to survey the scene, the guards were all lying on the floor, unconscious or otherwise so stunned that they could do little more than moan occasionally.  
  
She glanced up to the doorway, and the remaining silhouettes.  
  
The guard who had picked her off the floor earlier looked back at her, and, after a moment, pulled off her helmet. Her hair braids spilled free, and Lulu graced the Summoner with a smile.  
  
"I thought it was you," Yuna said, lifting her skirt so that she didn't trip as she carefully picked her way over the insensate forms on the floor. "What took you so long?"  
  
"Infiltrating Yevon isn't easy, ya?" That was Wakka as he was pulling off his pilfered helmet. The other three guards still standing were doing the same, and Yuna recognised them instantly as Al-Bhed. She remembered them from the airship.  
  
"Thanks for the fire gems," Yuna added, with a grin. "They were very useful."  
  
"Thank Rikku," Lulu said, running a hand to separate the damp braids even as she shucked the uncomfortable looking armour. "A gift from Home."  
  
"Rikku's not here?" Yuna glanced around, but did not catch sight of her blonde Al-Bhed cousin.  
  
"She and Cid are on the airship waiting for our signal. We're to meet them outside and they'll come and pick us up."  
  
"Then let's go!"  
  
The others exchanged fond and pleased glances between them, and then hurried after Yuna, lest the girl leave them behind as she ran.

* * *

Yuna had, in between breaths as they hurried along, tried to tell her friends of her experiences in captivity, but apart from the odd confrontation with Ismene or Isaaru there was very little of note to report.  
  
"She kept saying she wanted my help, my cooperation." Yuna bit her lip as they slowed as they reached a T-intersection. One of the Al-Bhed glanced around the corner, before signalling the all-clear and moving them on again.   
  
"But," she continued, "I got the feeling like... like there was something larger that Ismene was planning. Like she wanted to do more than just have me extoling the teachings of Yevon. Or maybe it's that Ismene doesn't strike me as the type for small talk."  
  
"It doesn't matter now," Wakka said, squeezing the elbow he was holding, and using to help her along when her strength flagged. "We have you, ya? That woman ain't going to do anything about you now."  
  
Yuna wished she felt more comforted by those words than she was.  
  
"The fastest way to the exit should be the next left," The Al-Bhed, Yuna thought his name was Atan, said as they ran along the hallways, the soundproofing muffling their passage and making their progress eerily quiet. "Here!"  
  
But the way was blocked. At the end of the hallway stood Ismene, and around here were what seemed like dozens of armed guards, all of them with their weapons unerringly pointed at the rescuers and their charge. Yuna briefly considered their odds of successfully running and escaping, but all of the guards looked to have itchy trigger fingers; they'd never make it out of range in time.  
  
In the end though, it seemed they wouldn't even get the chance. But at least they had an explanation as to why their passage had thus far been unchallenged: the guards had been setting up an ambush.  
  
"I tire of this," Ismene said, lazily gesturing to her guards. "Shoot them."  
  
The guards didn't hesitate, or give them a moment longer to contemplate their fate. They simply fired.  
  
But the bullets never hit them.  
  
Yuna realised why, as she saw the bright blue light burn. Before her, interlocking scales of a shield spell cast off light fiercely as the spell fought to turn the kinetic energy of bullets into heat and light.  
  
Lulu, she thought instantly, but no; the black mage was looking as surprised as the rest of them.  
  
Then she saw Isaaru, standing before him, loops of the shield spell still tangled around his fingers. She winced as she saw it. A degree of a shield spell still had to be bound to a living person, otherwise the scales separated and it was useless. But he wasn't simply still bound to the magic, he hadn't /released/ it yet. He was still feeding etheric strength directly into the spell, bypassing everything a mage was taught, their every instinct.  
  
She knew then how the spell covered the corridor, separating the two groups. Unreleased spells grew in power as the spellcaster retained them in their grip, but it exacted an exponentially greater toll upon the mage.  
  
"Isaaru," Ismene said, folding her arms and somehow managing to sound unsurprised. But Yuna saw the shakiness of her hands that the Priestess had quickly sought to hide. There was no way this was a ploy by the Priestess, nor was it expected. "I should have known you were up to something when no one could find you."  
  
"Just doing a little contemplating, Priestess."  
  
The bullets, having expended their momentum, fell to the floor with a clatter that went unremarked upon.  
  
"And what conclusions have you reached?" Ismene said, tilting her head in an effort to look inquisitive.  
  
"Only this: that you would become Sin anew," Isaaru said, words spat out in cutting shards. "I am a Summoner, born to defeat Sin. You, Ismene, must be stopped."  
  
Ismene actually started, her arms falling to her sides, and her mouth agape. "What are you talking about?!" She demanded, her voice rising to a near-shriek. "You would call me such, you who forsook your pilgrimage, who failed your world, your people, and your church!"  
  
Isaaru said nothing in response, though it was clear the her words stung him.  
  
"I will save Spira from its own foolhardiness. And you and that little whore-" Here, Yuna blinked. "-will accomplish nothing except to plunge Spira into anarchy."  
  
"If anyone is the fool, Ismene," Isaaru said, softly, "It is you."  
  
The High Priestess bristled at the statement.  
  
"Whore?" Yuna repeated, unsure whether to be offended or amused.  
  
"That's enough," Ismene said, her voice frighteningly calm now, as if she had made up her mind about something. "You have outlived your usefulness, all of you. Though, Isaaru, you have outlived yours far sooner than I would have expected."  
  
Everyone fell silent, waiting for Ismene's next move with baited breath.  
  
Into the stillness came Lulu's voice.  
  
"Don't tell me you're feeling crushed."  
  
The air itself seemed to thicken and swell, folding in upon itself. In the gap between the opponents, dark energy gathered, pulling in space itself. The gravity spell took hold, and as it collapsed, it took the corridor with it.  
  
"Come on!" Yuna lunged forward, grabbing at Isaaru's hand. With her fingers, she scythed through the links that kept him connected to his spell of protection. It was a risky thing to do without a doubt, but she had a feeling that he was too far into the magic to have cut the connection himself.  
  
The scales of the shield trembled for a moment, then shattered, flinging apart and then fading into nothing but soft motes of light. Isaaru staggered as if she had punched him in the head, and had no strength to resist as Yuna and her friends hauled him away from the field of battle, Ismene and the last ties he held to the Yevon church.  
  
- End of Part Thirteen 


	14. Obligatory Explanatory

  
  
Part Fourteen: Obligatory Explanatory  
  
"Yunie!"  
  
Yuna was nearly knocked off her feet, not even having had time to register her cousin's presence before one frantic Al-Bhed girl threw her arms around her, while chanting, "You're alright, I knew you had to be alright..." again and again.  
  
"Rikku-"  
  
Rikku drew back, keeping her hands on Yuna's shoulders and casting a critical look at the ex-Summoner, checking her for any overt signs of damage. "Did they hurt you? Did they feed you? Those meanies! Why I oughta-"  
  
"Rikku!" That was Cid, who, upon the airship's clearing of the garrison island, had come down from the bridge with Rikku to the cargo hold, where the group had ducked into during the airship's rapid and stomach-churning departure from the area. "Leave the girl alone, dammit."  
  
"Hey!" Rikku stomped her foot. "I was worried!" Then she turned back to Yuna and asked, in a slightly gentler, and somehow more sincere, tone, "You are okay, right, Yunie?"  
  
This time Yuna was the one to embrace her cousin, if less energetically than the girl had. "I'm fine, Rikku. They treated me well."  
  
Rikku bit her lip holding tightly to Yuna's hands as the ex-Summoner tried to draw away. "I'm so sorry for not having protected you in Guadosalam. It's all my fault, I'm... I'm a terrible Guardian-"  
  
"Rikku!" Cid again, glowering fiercely at his daughter. "Enough of that. Yuna doesn't need any of your moping."  
  
To someone who didn't know the peculiarities of this particular family, it might seem like chastisement. But all present knew what it was truly: that Cid was telling Rikku that there wasn't nothing she could have done, so she should really stop beating herself up over it (dammit).  
  
Everyone present except Isaaru, of course, who just looked confused.  
  
Rikku seemed to take it well, in that she drew herself up, and only threw a two or three epithets in the Al-Bhed language at her father before stalking off.  
  
Yuna and Lulu exchanged fond glances. Business as usual.  
  
Cid cast a look over Yuna that somehow seemed to be a perfect mirror for Rikku's visual check. "Get cleaned up, all of you," he ordered. "Then haul your asses up to the bridge. I got something you need to see."  
  
And then he was gone.  
  
Maybe it wasn't business as usual.

* * *

Feeling refreshed, and glad to have had the opportunity to have a shower, Yuna arrived on the bridge a quarter of an hour later. It had seemed to be somehow cathartic to physically scrub every last speck of dust her place of incarceration might have left on her from her body. It left her looking pink and flushed from where she had rubbed at the skin with a rough cloth, but she felt a certain satisfaction.  
  
Her arrival there caused her to find a grim looking group awakening her. Her three guardians and Cid stood next to the Sphere Oscillofinder, looking at her as she walked in. She refused to let the intensity of their regard throw her.  
  
Wakka was back in his normal clothes, but Lulu was cad in an Al-Bhed worksuit. It was an improvement on the guard outfit, at least. Yuna absently wondered why the woman had not brought her favored dress with her, and then shook her head for thinking of such fripperies when there was clearly something important going. But she did notice that Rikku was standing stiffly, and her clothing seemed rigid about her midsection. To support the injury Yuna remembered her getting?   
  
"What is it?" she asked, as she walked over to them.  
  
Rikku was clutching a sphere in her hands. "We lost contact with one of our survey teams exploring the eastern islands." She said, "So we sent another team after them. By the time they arrived, there was no sign of the original group, and in the end, only one of them made it back. She brought this."  
  
She extended her hands, and thumbed the activation switch.

* * *

_The image is indistinct, the visuals bouncing and juddering. It's clear that someone is carrying the recording sphere, and they're running fast, not giving any thought to where they're pointing the camera.  
  
"Hey! Siral! Over here!"  
  
Siral, who must be holding the camera, changes direction, heading over towards the direction of the shout. A female can just be seen in shot, lying down holding a pair of binoculars that are focused off in the distance. She's only visible for a moment, then the camera sees only the brush as its set down as Siral joins his companion on the ground.  
  
"There..." A near whisper, and the camera is picked up again. Grasses are pulled out of the ground and discarded, giving a blurry image of something in the distance.  
  
Then the image starts to sharpen as Siral focuses the lenses. A large building starts to take shape, and then so does the background. The building itself is huge, ellipse shaped, surrounded by circular grounds. In these grounds are ranks upon ranks of soldiers, all moving in perfect unison. Militarily trained Yevonites, a degree of precision not found in the regular ground. This is no normal guard training facility, this is a place where soldiers are bred for combat.  
  
And in the background are two more buildings, identical. There must be hundreds of soldiers there.  
  
"Searing sands and skies above," Siral, speaking for the first time, and sounding horrified. "Why would they need all these people and weapons."  
  
It's easy to work out why. Why does anyone train to kill?  
  
To kill, of course.  
  
"Let's get out of here," The female says. "We have to-"  
  
"HEY!"  
  
It's neither of the observers who shouts, and from the way the image suddenly loses focus and starts bouncing again, its clear the two are running in fear, not caring about whether they've turned the camera off or not.  
  
The sound of shots rings out, and Siral falls to the ground, the camera falling with him. The image only shows booted feet approaching rapidly. The female bends and snatches up the camera, whispering an apology and a tearful farewell to Siral, and then runs again.   
  
The image goes dark._

__

_

* * *

_  
Silence reigned for a long, sickening moment after the images faded from sight, if not mind.  
  
Cid was leaning against a console, his arms crossed. "Those bastards killed him and the others to protect their secret."  
  
"Hardly surprising." That was Isaaru, causing faces to turn towards him in surprise. Most of them hadn't seen him enter. "The project relies on no one outside knowing about its existence."  
  
"Who are they?" Lulu asked, narrowing crimson eyes at him.  
  
"The soldiers?" Lulu nodded, and Isaaru shrugged. "Yevon, of course. But a special task force. Raised in the Temple, each and every one of them has been bred to obey the words of the Priests and Priestesses as if they were the words of Yevon himself. And so they would never question any order, not any."  
  
"But... what would they want with such an army?"  
  
"It's not what 'they' want, it's what Ismene wants." Isaaru was looking directly at Yuna. "Remember what I said in the hallway?"  
  
Yuna returned his intent look blankly, mind turning over as she tried to understand what it could possibly be that he was referring to.   
  
Then it hit her, and she felt bile rise in a way that was unrelated to her pregnancy. "No..." she croaked, shakily sinking onto the seat she had been standing next to and covering her mouth as she swallowed rapidly. "Not even they would be so... obscene."  
  
Isaaru closed his eyes, lowering his chin to his chest in what was either a nod or a prayer for deliverance.  
  
"What?" Rikku looked utterly confused, glancing around. "What did he say?"  
  
Wakka reached up and scratched the back of his neck. "That... ah... I can't remember... something about Sin, ya?"  
  
Lulu's breath caught in her throat, as she made the same leap that Yuna had. "That Ismene would become Sin anew."  
  
"I wasn't really speaking literally," said Isaaru softly, still not having opened his eyes. "But to all intents and purposes, that it exactly what she seeks."  
  
"I don't understand," Rikku admitted quietly.  
  
Isaaru raised his head, and started to explain, his voice low, as if he were relating some unimportant anecdote, rather than ground-shattering information.  
  
"With this army, Ismene could order an attack, against a village, ship or town. And the soldiers, so indoctrinated they function little more independently than machina, would wipe them out. All of them. Every man, woman and child. With no one left to tell what had happened, Yevon could say that Sin had returned, people would flock back to the church, and they retain their power.  
  
"Ismene said she wanted to preserve stability." Isaaru, sounding like a little boy who's slowly realising that the world doesn't work the way he'd like. "But it's rule by fear, and has the potential to be even more devastating than Sin who, at the end of the day, was a monster, but was hardly human."  
  
The others glanced at each other, and decided not to let Isaaru know of what Sin really had been for now.  
  
"Spira would be denied its hope," Yuna said after a while, as they all sat, or stood, in stunned silence and digested what Isaaru had revealed to them. "Summoners can't defeat an army. There would be no Final Summoning, no Calm to come."  
  
"It's why she was willing to wait for you as long as necessary. Pass a few years in a 'Calm' and then Sin returns. So much for the word of a heretic who proclaimed Sin dead." Isaaru bit off his words, as if keen to be rid of them.  
  
"And you were helping them," Cid said, in a low growl.  
  
The others glanced between Cid and Isaaru nervously, and then at each other, perhaps wondering who, if anyone, would be the one to restrain Cid from physically attacking the male former Summoner.   
  
But Isaaru drew himself and said, in a calm voice that was somehow tinged with self-loathing. "My lord, I could perhaps offer the excuse that my cooperation with Yevon was under duress, it would only be partially true. While it was understood by me that there was an implied threat against my brothers should I fail to accede to their wishes, perhaps the greater reason for my collaboration was simple apathy. With the end of the Fayth and Sin, my reason to be ceased. I am a Summoner, born to deal death to the bringer of death, to defeat Sin. Ismene has become Sin, and so my task now is to destroy her. I see that now as I did not then, weighed down with a lack of caring. Perhaps you can thank Lady Yuna for opening my eyes. There is a world beyond the void that the Fayth have left, one that needs my protection."  
  
He turned his head away. "And all I can do after that is to see that I die in the best way I can." Smoothing away a wrinkle in his robes, he turned and walked off the bridge.  
  
Yuna staring after them, her rolling stomach not having calmed any at Isaaru's words. "What does he mean by that?" Although his words seemed clear, Yuna felt like she'd just listened to a long speech in Ronso, unable to understand the meanings behind the sounds. Was this shock?  
  
Rikku sighed loudly, "I think I know what Maroda was talking about now."  
  
Lulu and Wakka nodded silently.  
  
At the questioning glances of her father and Yuna, Rikku took a deep breath, and started to speak.

* * *

And of his brother, what Maroda told Lulu, Rikku and Wakka was this:  
  
Isaaru was tired, Maroda knew that more than anything. He could see it in the way his brother moved, the way his staff slipped limply from his grip to the floor whenever he stumbled into their rooms, and the dark circles under his eyes spoke volumes. It seemed that Isaaru had been doing nothing but Sending the dead for days now. He perform the Sending, before he would stumble home, soul weary and exhausted, falling asleep on the closest vaguely padded surface, barely stirring when either Maroda or Pacce came with soup or something light to eat. And then he would awaken, and they would call for him again, needing him to Send the souls of the dead bodies that they had pulled out of the debris in the western part of the city while Isaaru had slept.  
  
Yevon would not relieve his burden and allow another Summoner to assist, for they had none anywhere within their city boundaries. And so Maroda watched his brother continue to run himself to the bone, until he began to fear that every time he touched the dead, he left a little bit of himself with them.  
  
Isaaru danced the Sending now, under Maroda and Pacce's anxious and watchful eyes. There was no time or space to prepare the bodies of the dead for their internment beneath the waves of the sea, so instead they were placing the bodies on funeral pyres, to clear the way for those still living. It was of no consequence to a Summoner. In the Sending, the elements shaped themselves to the Summoner's will, and it was as inconsequential as a gnat's bite.  
  
The flames licked up around Isaaru's body, hungry, eager to taste his flesh and rend it as easily as they did that of the bodies they reduced to little more than ash and charred bone around him. But they dove away from his staff, which looked as if it were two lotus blossoms intertwined at the head, and were forced to be kept at bay. The fire sought, but Isaaru's steps avoided them all deftly, as he turned and wafted a small swarm of pyreflies up on the heated air currents, their song nostalgic and sad.  
  
With many of the male Summoners, who donned thick heavy robes, it was difficult to see the grace that they wielded in the dance. Indeed, Maroda could laughingly recall when he had been younger, teasing Isaaru mercilessly for his clumsiness when his brother stumbled over his own feet or tripped over a set of stairs. But Isaaru had emerged from Bevelle Temple, after attaining Bahamut, his first Aeon and who Isaaru had called Spathi in his Summons, and had stood before the Yevon clerics and the people of Bevelle to Summon the creature and prove that he had indeed become a Summoner, and Maroda how he had danced so elegantly, staff twirling and arms moving in a graceful dance that brought the great dragon down to them. He remembered how Bahamut had bowed to Isaaru, who had laughed at the thanks for such a performance.  
  
Isaaru had been flushed with excitement, and Maroda had teased him as to how he could no longer make fun of Isaaru for his clumsiness.  
  
Maroda could see a trace of the old clumsiness creeping into Isaaru's movements in the Sending now. He never missed a step, or fumbled his staff, but it was the careful precision with which he conducted himself that gave it away. Since becoming a Summoner, Isaaru had become more physical confident, no longer checking every step he made, or watching where he walked. That he was so conscious of his own motions showed Maroda how worried Isaaru was that he would err.  
  
And then it happened. The death of Sin.  
  
The sky flooded with light. Pacce, beside him, gasped and cried out in shock at the sudden brightness, turning night into day. Maroda's eyes went instantly to the heavens, searching the sky for the cause.  
  
Caught in the Sending, Isaaru danced on.  
  
Maroda had heard whispers that after confronting the Al-Bhed ship over Bevelle, causing the destruction to which they were tending, Sin had moved to near the Calm Lands, not too far from the city. What this Sin's doing, he wondered? And then the song reached his ears. Pyreflies. The great field of light that flooded the skies was millions of pyreflies, singing and calling out in their inimitable fashion. Maroda was unsure how long he stood there, watching the skies, wondering if this was Lady Yuna's doing, and if this was one final attack by Sin, and that their end was coming.  
  
And in the end, it was the pyreflies that pulled Maroda's attention away from the vista, for they had started to scream.  
  
Maroda glanced down and called out in shock as he saw his brother falter in the Sending, his staff slipping from his fingers, which had stopped moving, and being flung from the flames. The pyreflies, angry at their dance being so interrupted, were shrieking, causing several of those nearest the fire to cover their ears. But Isaaru had stopped moving, his eyes wide.  
  
The flames' fingers sought him out, snatching and swiping at his clothing, moving across skin, and Maroda, with nary a hesitation, leapt upwards into the fire, grabbing Isaaru by a piece of his robe and yanking him bodily from the pyre before the flames could claim him as well.  
  
Pacce, who had snapped out of his stupor with his brother's leap, was casting water spells to douse the flames and soak the garments that had begun to smolder, but he, and Maroda, seemed at a loss for what to do as Isaaru, if anything, became worse as he was removed from the fire. He choked, clawing at his chest and called out hoarsely, his eyes unfocussed and unseeing. Maroda wasn't entirely sure that his brother was still with them in the here and now.  
  
Was it the Sending? Was it finally one dance too many and his brother's spirit was calling out to join those on the Farplane?  
  
"Don't go!"  
  
Isaaru's voice was barely recognisable, hoarse and desperate, and before Maroda could ask who Isaaru was so keen to keep with them, his brother began to weep. The people of Bevelle kept their distance, not knowing how to deal with a Summoner who was acting thusly.  
  
"No," he began to repeat, "No, no, no."  
  
Maroda smoothed his brother's hair back from his forehead, where it had been plastered their by sweat from the heat and whatever nightmare held his brother in its grip.  
  
"Isaaru, come back to us," Pacce's voice was entreating, and Maroda saw the telltale green tinge of a Cure spell wash over Isaaru, the scent obscured by the smoke from the fire. He appreciated Pacce's effort, but he wasn't entirely sure this was some affliction of the body that could be so easily fixed.  
  
"Don't leave..."  
  
Maroda shook his head, feeling tears prick at his own eyes, tears of helplessness. "We're not going anywhere, brother. We're right here."  
  
Isaaru was reaching out to something unseen, and Maroda didn't think his words were heard. "Please don't leave me."  
  
Pacce and Maroda exchanged twin looks of fear.  
  
And then he screamed.  
  
It was like nothing that Maroda would ever hear again, though no sound issued from Isaaru's mouth. The pyreflies, still caught in the spell Isaaru had woven with his steps, screamed with him in sympathy, the sound passing from pyrefly to pyrefly until half the audience was on their knees, hands over their ears and trembling under the sonic assault.   
  
The pyreflies streamed upward and outward, passing in straight, fast, lines rather than their usual meandering pathways. Several people yelled in surprise as a pyrefly passed straight through them unheeding. They fled, joining the currents of their fellows swelling the sky, and the sound died away to an echo that only remained in the ringing of the ears of the listeners.  
  
"Gone," Isaaru said, with the finality of a door slamming shut. His eyes focused on his brothers, but they were dull and so without life that Maroda feared that he had indeed passed on to the Farplane and all that remained behind was an Unsent husk. "They're gone."  
  
"Who are?" Maroda asked softly, even though he could barely hear his own voice over the audio afterimages of the scream.  
  
Isaaru was weeping freely now. "The Fayth. They are gone." And he had broken down, needing to be carried back to the Temple for a mind healer to see to him.  
  
When Maroda related this story to Yuna's Guardians, much later, Lulu would say that Yuna had not experienced anything so horrible as she Sent the Aeons. Maroda would only smile sadly and say,  
  
"The Fayth were not only weapons to Isaaru, a means to defeat Sin, they were his duty, and his bond, his anchor. They were, in a very literal sense of the word, his life. When they left, everything became... pointless."  
  
But even though they struggled to understand, neither Lulu, Rikku nor Wakka could understand what he meant by that.

* * *

And now, with this little bit of extra information, Yuna understood. She understood all too well.

* * *

"You were suicidal."  
  
Isaaru turned to face her, causing his hair to whip around his face at a new angle. The wind on the deck was merciless and driving, but people were prevented from being flung off entirely by some sort of traction field generated by the machina within the ship. Yuna had asked an engineer to explain it to her once, and had come away with the absolute certainty that she must never ask about machina again lest she burst a blood vessel.  
  
Yuna was standing close enough to be heard, but far enough away that there was no chance of accidental, or purposeful for that matter, contact between them. Her light skirt fluttered in the wind, and she had to grip the edges to keep it from showing anything indecent. Isaaru's robes were heavy enough to resist the motions of the air. For a moment, she envied him his choice in clothing.  
  
"'Were', Yuna?" Isaaru's mouth twisted wryly. "I thought I made it quite plain that I still am. Although, 'suicidal' is perhaps the wrong word."  
  
Yuna stared at him in horror. "How can you speak so casually of such a thing?" she asked, her voice a near whisper, but it still carried. Or perhaps Isaaru just had very good hearing.  
  
"How can you be surprised?" He countered. "You are-were a Summoner. Do you honestly believe that anyone who undergoes a Summoner's training, who walks the path of the pilgrim, does not, at some deep level of their soul, not truly desire death? And that they are not prepared to embrace their destruction with every fibre of their being?" He made a little half-shrug of a gesture. "Summoners rarely require Sending, you know."  
  
"Belgemine?"  
  
Isaaru actually smiled at that. "Ah yes, her. She beat me hands down, you know? But she stayed because she had a task. I think she would have willingly accepted her fate."  
  
"She did," Yuna said quietly.   
  
"Then you see?" Isaaru gave her a gentle, understanding look, which she wanted to wipe from his face. "So tell me, Yuna, can you say, in all honesty, that the idea of death didn't seem at all appealing to you?"  
  
"I was willing to die for Spira. My death was inconsequential to give hope to Spira."  
  
Isaaru said nothing, staring at her patiently.  
  
"No," she hissed, turning away and stalking to the edge of the deck. "Don't you dare ascribe whatever demons you created to me."  
  
There was a long silence, and then she heard Isaaru move to stand next to her, overlooking the sea as it whipped by below them at fantastical speeds. "How about deathwish instead, hmm? Good a word as any, I suppose. Do you want me to tell you my story?"  
  
She wanted to say 'no' and maybe push him off the side, but instead she said nothing.   
  
Isaaru seemed to take that as permission. "I lived, with my father, my mother and my brothers, in a village not too far from Bevelle. It was close enough that most of the time we were afforded the same protection as Bevelle from Sin's attacks. But it was hardly foolproof. And so Sin came, as he did to so many towns and villages, and killed four fifths of the population. I can name the survivors, and the number less than three handfuls. My mother, a..." Isaaru pressed his lips together briefly, and forged ahead. "A woman I..." It seemed he couldn't finish that sentence, and he carried on. "Her son, everyone, in fact, that I had ever really cared about, save my brothers and father, and he died from his injuries not long after."  
  
In Yuna's mind she filled in the blanks, and closed her eyes. Any tears she might have shed were dried instantly in the wind, and for that she was glad.  
  
"Ever since I was little, I had thought of becoming a Summoner. As a child, it was something to be aspired to, to be a hero, as I grew older, an apathy at the world that made eternal sleep appealing, and after that... death was something to be actively desired. Maroda once accused me of being a little bit in love with death, and maybe he was right, but I really was too much of a coward to go through with it by my own hand. So I became a Summoner. Part vengeance, part childhood dream, part... fulfillment of desire.   
  
"But then you destroyed Sin. Make no mistake, Yuna, you have my eternal gratitude and that of Spira for doing so, but in so doing, my death had been taken from me, so I couldn't care about what I did anymore. What, in all truth, was the point? I think Yevon knew that, and so didn't have much qualms about using me.   
  
"Now, my death has become a just punishment, for what I was willing to go along with. All I can hope is that it can be seen as an honorable demise."  
  
Yuna didn't even realise what she was doing until she realised that she was staring up at him, her hands fisted in the front of his rooms, doing her best to shake him angrily, as much as she could with the strength in her small body.  
  
"You selfish bastard!"  
  
She felt disconnected, like it wasn't her voice saying the words, that someone else was using her throat, her body. All she could see was Isaaru's face, feel the sudden dryness in her mouth, and the renewed churning in her stomach.  
  
"How could you say I'm anything like you? I didn't want to sacrifice myself for some glorified suicidal insanity. I didn't want to die for me. It was for Spira. It was all for Spira. For the people who had to die, at the hands of the great monster who destroyed indiscriminately. A deadly relic, it later turns out, of a war from a thousand years ago. Death begetting death, and the only way to stop it, if only for a little while, is to die. That's nothing like your 'desire for death'. It was hope. It was noble."  
  
Her voice cracked. "It was for the children who had to grow up without their fathers. The ones who had to rely on nothing more than the kindness of the people who were around them. Who had to receive their life lessons from virtual strangers because there was no one else to say anything to them, who..."  
  
And then she realised what she was saying, and she crumpled to the deck, her grip on Isaaru's robes dragging him down with her. Tears streaked down her face, and what the wind didn't dry was soaked into the rich cloth of his garment. "I just wanted to see my father again," she sobbed. "I just wanted to see him again, and feel his arms around me, and hear him tell me that everything was alright. I just wanted to see my father again."  
  
She didn't even register that Isaaru had wrapped his arms around her shoulders and was rocking her gently.   
  
She added, miserably, "If he had to die, why shouldn't I?"  
  
"No reason, Yuna," Isaaru said, in a soft whisper. "No reason at all."

* * *

"We have to destroy the base."  
  
Yuna stood on the bridge, facing the Al-Bhed and her Guardians with her fists clenched and a determined expression on her face. Isaaru lurked near the exit, blending in with the shadows remarkably well considering the sheen of the cloth he wore. It probably made all the difference that he didn't want to be seen.  
  
Cid was the one to voice what they all thought. "You what?"  
  
"We have to destroy-"  
  
"I heard you the first time, girl." Cid glowered at her. "You know that this ship can't take on an entire army by itself."  
  
"It took on Sin."  
  
"It worked when we took on Sin," Rikku said, dubiously. "And was mostly loaded with ammunition."  
  
"Ship works! We fight for Yuna!" That was Brother, who Rikku and Cid pointedly ignored.  
  
"The airship is still the most powerful force on the planet, now the Aeons are gone."  
  
/Now the Aeons are gone.../  
  
For some reason, that resonated within her, but she tried to ignore it, in favour of pressing her point.  
  
"There's no one else on Spira who can amass any sort of force right now. And now is when we must act."  
  
"What's the rush?" Lulu asked, tilting her head. "Yevon is running on a timetable that will take years. We have time to prepare, to warn others."  
  
"No we don't," Wakka this time, and he was peering at Isaaru with remarkable understanding. "Because he knows, and he escaped. So they're going to try and kill us. Because now we know."  
  
Yuna closed her eyes, bowing her head. "Yevon can't be allowed any more time to build their assets." She said. "I... I cannot believe I am suggesting such a thing, against people, but we have to stop them. We have to destroy the base, the three training camps. We have to do it before it's too late."  
  
Lulu nodded slowly, reluctantly. "She's right. We have to act, and we're the only ones that have the means. We fought Sin. We can fight Yevon's army."  
  
And then Yuna realised the root of the resonation with her, and she realised that there was another option. But she said nothing of it, only, "We have to fight Yevon's army. We don't have a choice. It would be hypocritical to destroy Sin, and leave Yevon alone when it tried to mimic the monster."  
  
Cid sighed, looking at each of them in turn and then glancing around his crew. Those who spoke both Al-Bhed and the common tongue were providing a running translation for their unilingual colleagues, and they all looked back at him with determined expressions on their faces.  
  
They would fight.  
  
"Fine," Cid grumped, though they could tell there was equal parts duty and a certain anticipation of a good fight burning behind the leader's gruff attitude. "But if we all die, don't come crawling to me. I'll only say 'I told you so'."  
  
- End of Part Fourteen 


	15. The Act One Gun

* * *

Part Fifteen: The Act One Gun

* * *

Yuna critically regarded the reflection she beheld in the surface of a particularly shiny bridge bulkhead panel. She was still clad in a the traveling robes she'd donned for her trip to Guadosalam, although she had discarded the outer layers in the desert climate of the garrison island. Even though her robes were entirely modest she couldn't help but feel somewhat naked. She was to fight, and she stood without weapons, armor, or items to aid her. Not for the first time, she faintly regretted her decision to lay down her arms at the culmination of her pilgrimage. But then, would have being armed really made that much of a difference?  
  
"Yuna?"  
  
It was Wakka, standing by the entryway. He held in his hands what looked like little more than a collection of short metal pipes.  
  
"You said you need a weapon, ya?" He stepped forward and held out the bundle. "One of the girls on Besaid wanted you to have this."  
  
So that was what it was. Yuna could easily see now that it was a Summoner's staff in its collapsed, transportable state. The folded segments were clumsily presented to Yuna.  
  
"I tried to assemble it, ya? But I think it's broken," Wakka told her.  
  
Yuna smiled, before reaching into the mess to grab one particular section of metal. Then, with a flick of her wrist, the other sections snapped into place, and Yuna was holding in her hand a fully formed staff, with a head that looked rather like a sunflower.  
  
"It's all in the wrist," Yuna said, with a grin at Wakka's startled expression.  
  
Already she could feel the abilities woven into the staff start to flood her veins. Her movements sped up even as the world around her slowed down. She set the staff aside, closed it into its compact form once again. Such speed was always very useful in battle.  
  
"I'll have to thank her," Yuna said.  
  
Wakka turned away. She wasn't sure, but he might have said "I wouldn't."  
  
She wondered what he meant by that.  
  
"Okie dokie, people," Cid clapped his hands noisily, drawing all attention towards him. The Sphere Oscillofinder was displaying the globe of Spira, their current location enlarged in a separate hologram hovering just above the surface.  
  
"This is where we are, this is the island where Yevon's been putting together its little party. From the sphere recording and what we can see from afar, this is what we're facing. Three towers, though the majority of their base is likely to be underground, at least from what Isaaru tells us. He also gave us a good idea of the numbers of grunts in there, and their weapons. Turns out we're only facing hundreds of heavily armed personnel and mages, who were all to be used to kill as many people as possible. Should be fun," declared Cid, glancing around the group with a determined glint in his eye. "Everyone ready?"  
  
"Ready," was the murmured response from all present.  
  
"Ready, but I would say this: consider what we are facing," Isaaru said, quietly. The other turned towards him, eyeing him carefully. "The Yevon base has stood there for centuries. It has been a bastion of the faith all that time. Only the purest of belief were taken there, and most have grown up within those walls of religion and absolute worship, and know nothing else. They cannot be swayed, they cannot be persuaded that the Church is wrong. Because the Church is everything to them, they would die for it, and if we do not stop them, they will kill for it."

* * *

Perhaps it was a misguided sense of chivalry that drove her to insist, perhaps it was a determination not to become the enemy they were fighting, but it was on Yuna's word that the Al-Bhed airship and her crew gave up the one of the most valuable elements in any strategy: the element of surprise.  
  
They did not dive out of the sun, raining missiles and energy beams down upon the Yevonites. Instead, they hailed them openly, warning them of what was to come, giving them a chance to surrender. It was a mistake, perhaps, though Yuna's conscience did feel somewhat better for it when it became the Church who attacked first.  
  
The compound was immediately recognisable, even though their only reference was taken from the poor and grainy quality of a sphere recording. It was only now, as they saw it with their own eyes, that they sort how obviously Yevon had chosen to make their presence known. Three towers, each of differing heights and carved out of a local dark, rust red stone, were arranged in a triangular formation around a concave indentation in the ground, an artificial crater lined with the same rock as the buildings were make of. But inset in such a way that it must surely only be visible from the air was a darker stone, veined with what might have been lapis lazuli for the pure blue tones it held, laid in the shape of the Eye of Yevon. For all that only the Al-Bhed possessed the technology to fly, it had to be wondered who they were trying to impress.  
  
Almost as Yuna's voice died out, the last remnants of her amplified voice faded from the stone walls, openings appeared high in the towers. Out of them streamed fiends, tamed by the magics of the Yevonite priests somehow. Perhaps there were Guado amongst them. Flying fiends, they were, for any based on the ground would have been useless. There were Garudas and Evil Eyes, Bombs, Bite Bugs and elemental creatures of various alignments. Alycones dove through the dry, hot air, trying to peck at the weaponry of the Al-Bhed that was forced to turn towards short-range fighting, while others lunged for the Al-Bhed, shooting out of open portholes in the sides of the ship. No one was foolish enough to stand in the open, on deck.  
  
On the ground, doors were opening, and soldiers were hurrying out in droves. If their eyesight had been up to the task, the crew of the airship would have noticed that none looked worried or caught off-guard. Not a piece of armor was out of place, nor did anyone look uncomfortable entering a battle. In spite of Isaaru's assertion that the force at this base hadn't been deployed in decades, they were quite clearly all combat ready.  
  
But Cid had been prepared. He hadn't faced a hostile Yevon force for many years without having exactly the mindset needed in the event of entering battle with the church that dominated Spira. Before they had even approached, Cid had ensured that they had one full complement of missiles in the tubes and ready to be launched. Perhaps the only difference between the plan and the execution was that he hadn't expected to launch them so soon.  
  
Maybe he was getting soft, he would later wonder. He had been hoping that Yuna's strategy would work, and they wouldn't have to get into a firefight. But instead, as fiends swarmed the airship, overwhelming the meagre close-quarters defenses they had, he gave the order to fire.  
  
The missiles, aimed hastily and fired nearly wildly, did not all hit their intended target. Two missiles hit a cluster of fiends, the expulsion of pyreflies nearly masked by the explosion itself. Others struck the largest and smallest of the towers, causing mostly cosmetic damage on the latter, and demolishing part of the exterior of the former. But it was the middle-sized tower that sustained the worst of the damage. The majority of the missiles, the Al-Bhed airship having been closer to that tower, struck the stone, sending rockdust and shrapnel flying in nearly every direction. Lulu, Isaaru and the three Al-Bhed mages that had been on board, quickly followed up this attack with powerful water spells, washing away the mortar holding the stone blocks together, casting what flare and gravity spells they could, rocking the foundations and then dragging the loose stones to the ground. As the gunners aboard realised what was going on, they concentrated their firepower on that tower, it became obvious what the result was. Audibly cracking under the strain of holding itself upright under gravity spells and a weakened shell, the tower started to crumble, most of the top half falling off, landing in the artificial crater, the only area clear of fighters on the ground, while other floors compressed, collapsing under their own weight.  
  
What was left of the tower was only an abbreviated remnant of its former self. It was perhaps that which caused the Yevonites to realise what a genuine threat this machina vessel represented.  
  
Now, from the other towers, the White Mages had appeared, moving to ring the area in a barrier of white-clad bodies. Their hands were held out to the sides, and their voices were raised in a steady droning chants. Protective shields were cast, and recast when they failed, others in ranks further forward cast restorative magic, and revived those who had fallen to the concussive blasts of the Al-Bhed weaponry, and those closest to where the ship was cast magic to dispel anything shields that those aboard had placed about themselves.  
  
And then the Black Mages appears, in twos and threes, appearing as speckles dressed in blacks, blues and purples, that dotted the mass on the ground. Each of them was holding some sort of magical aid, a staff, usually, that amplified their power, and they began throwing spells. Most of them only seemed to know elemental magic, but gradually more skilled mages were emerging from the damaged buildings and suddenly started casting flare spells, gravity spells, and occasionally a white mage gathered their strength enough to cast a holy spell that ripped through the ship with white light, causing everyone to be forced to stop what they were doing to bear the pain. Aboard the airship, the mages they did have were exhausting themselves, Yuna flagging under the healing she was conducting near constantly, and the ship was running out of ammunition.  
  
The simple fact of the matter seemed to be that they were outnumbered.  
  
The only good thing about the situation was perhaps that a lot of them were bad shots, combined with Brother's maniacal piloting skills, which meant a fair amount of the fire they were taking hit the fiends, and causing them to burst into pyreflies. But they were still coming.  
  
So naturally, just when it seemed that the situation couldn't get any worse, it did.

* * *

It was that central, artificial crater from which the new threat came. It seemed so innocent on the surface. It seemed nothing more than a harmless bit of decoration, the ostentatious rubbish that Yevon liked to come up with. But it seemed to be shaking.  
  
Little puffs of rock dust wafted upwards in short, sharp movements. The rocks shifted in time with the rhythmic pounding that seemed be be happening underneath the surface. The air around the crater became filled with a haze of dirt and shrapnel.  
  
It happened all at once. With a final burst of movement, the crater, which now revealed itself to be made up of small, tightly compacted blocks of stone, disintegrated, falling inwards as a hole was created in the very centre. But some of the blocks rose upwards, on the back of the creature which had made its exit into the outside world through that solid wall of rock and stone.  
  
As they tumbled away, they revealed a creature with mottled ruby red and azure hide stretched thinly over a long and sinuous body. Faint, almost transparent wings supported the body, bringing it higher into the air, while claws gleamed wetly, and the flesh over the snout drew back to allow the creature to howl long and loudly.  
  
It was not a fiend, nor a machina creation. It was something else entirely.

* * *

"Is that..." Wakka sounded like he was fighting to speak through his shock. "Is that Evrae?"  
  
At the scanner console, Rikku raised her hand to her mouth to stifle a gasp. "The egg!"  
  
Cid turned to look gravely at his niece. "This is why you wanted us to attack now instead of later, isn't it?"  
  
Yuna bowed her head. "Yes," she said, quietly.  
  
Cid looked at her a moment longer. "You don't ever keep stuff like that from me again." And then he turned back to barking orders at the crew.  
  
Yuna turned to glance back at Isaaru, who returned her gaze with a faint hint of despair.

* * *

They had been sitting atop the airship, on deck, while Yuna recovered from her crying jag, when Isaaru had told her.  
  
"Is this where you battled Evrae?" Isaaru had asked. "Was it a hard battle?"  
  
"I wasn't here," Yuna said, eyeing a score line in the metal where she was told that Evrae's claws had gouged the airship. "I was a little busy getting married, but I'm told it was a very difficult fight."  
  
"Could you defeat it again, if you had to." There was an urgent note in Isaaru's voice, and it made her turn and look at him questioningly.  
  
"What's going on?" she asked, warily.  
  
"There is," Isaaru began, after a long pause. "An egg in the possession of the Yevonite army. It is the single offspring of the Guardian Wyrm of Bevelle. It is Evrae's egg.  
  
"No one is entirely sure how it works. Perhaps there is magic involved, or some strange force of nature. All that is certain is that Evrae will lay one egg in its lifetime, and that egg will not hatch while the creature lives still. Then, a few weeks after its death, the egg shatters, and, to all intents and purposes, Evrae emerges anew. The hatchling is, for all intents and purposes, Evrae. Without training it responds to commands that its predecessor did. It is almost as if the creature as been resurrected.  
  
"That was the task that Yevon removed me from Bevelle to accomplish. I was to oversee the hatching of the creature, to make sure that its memories were intact, and to impress upon it its place within the army that Yevon had created."  
  
"You're honestly telling me that there was no one else that Yevon could find to do the same task?"  
  
Isaaru shrugged minutely. "Perhaps. But the devastation Sin wrought upon Bevelle was very extensive, and they were on a schedule."  
  
Yuna stiffened before she even realised she was doing so. "A schedule. You mean you know when the egg will hatch?"  
  
Isaaru nodded slowly. "If, that is, Evrae's offspring holds to the same timetable that the creature has in the seven hundred years of protecting Bevelle."  
  
Yuna bit her lip. "It's probably safe to say that such a thing is very likely indeed. So, when?"  
  
"Soon. Very soon."

* * *

Evrae wheeled about in the sky for a moment, enjoying its moment of freedom after having escaped from the confinement of its underground cell. But then it spied it, the metal bird, the flying machine that its masters had taught it to hate, to fear, to kill. Claws outstretched, it dove for the airship, and it was perhaps only Brother's insane flying skills that saved the airship from losing its entire engine housing.  
  
Turning through the air, the vessel was forced to flee from the pursuing creature, which unfortunately was far more agile than the machina could ever be. Claw marks gouged the hull, tail-impacts caused whole sections of plating to cave in, or windows to shatter, causing the air pressure to suddenly drop inside the hull. Inside, crew were forced to flee deeper into the ship, to the inner sections where the atmospheric pressure was still breathable. Unlike the top deck, there weren't fields in place to allow people to breath and live in the rarified atmosphere that could be found high in the sky.  
  
The slight advantage that the airship had in the sky, firing down from above, or with its superior technology was lost as the bulky ship failed to escape from the creature.  
  
Yes, the situation had definitely gotten worse.

* * *

Inside the airship, Isaaru swung around, staring around the bridge in confusion. "Where's Yuna?"

* * *

Magic poured forth from Yuna's fingertips, the backwash of the firaga spell and the raw heat she was producing by melting the lift doorway. As a side effect, she was also rendering the lift mechanism itself completely non-functional, but that was of no consequence; she was perfectly able to climb the utility ladder that lay along the lift shaft.  
  
The metal cooling behind her, she carried on moving.

* * *

Isaaru hurried through the ship, leaving behind a confused group on the bridge who, nevertheless, had no time to spare by following him to find out what he was doing. He had seen a monitor feed on the bridge, of Yuna entering the lift shaft, and melting the door mechanism. He had a horrible, sinking feeling that he knew what it was she was doing.  
  
He snagged a technician as he ran past, who was using a cutting tool to try and excise a section of bulkhead that had caved in.  
  
"You," he ordered brusquely, "With me."  
  
"But-" The technician resisted, pulling back. "Damage control, I-"  
  
Isaaru stopped, glaring at the worker. "Do you want to explain to Cid why you left his niece up on deck to get killed?"  
  
The technician gulped audibly, gathered his tools, and hurried after Isaaru.

* * *

Yuna perhaps wasn't sure what possessed her to come up onto the deck, Marta's gift of a staff in her hands, which was helping her far more than the girl had probably intended, with the decision to carry out her plan in her mind. Perhaps more disturbing to her was the knowledge of where the idea had come from.  
  
She stopped in the middle of the deck, ignoring the sounds of people trying to get through the door she had sealed shut with a powerful fire spell, and took a deep breath. She ignored the spells and bullets that flung towards her, trusting her magic to keep it at bay long enough to do what was needed.  
  
Then she raised her staff before her, and started calling pyreflies to her.  
  
She wasn't sure it would work. For all she knew, death was a requirement in order to be successful, after all, that was the state in which she had found Yu Yevon, Seymour and Yunalesca.  
  
She was a Summoner, and at the basis of the Summoning Arts, as Lady Nadim had taught her, were those basic blocks of Spira's existence: pyreflies. They existed everywhere, in everything, and Summoners were able to control them, to a degree. They could call the pyreflies together, to call an Aeon, really a cluster of pyreflies imbued with the power of the Fayth, they could dispel them, in Sendings.  
  
But Yuna knew now, from experience, that pyreflies could be used by a Summoner to forge an armor stronger than any metal or woven cloth in Spira.  
  
Which was what she was trying to do.  
  
There was only one doubt in her mind, a doubt she had to forcibly put aside so as to even begin to try to complete her self-assigned task.  
  
Those Summoners she had seen create armors had all been dead and Unsent. Each of them had changed the pyreflies of their own body to merge with the alterations they desired, and so become stronger, more powerful. Yuna was still counted among the living, and so her form was still immutable, by the laws of nature.  
  
Pyreflies were starting to swirl about her, the air becoming thick with them, as more and more fiends broke apart under attack. She had to do something, and so she did the only thing she knew how: she fixed her mind upon the goal, and began to dance.  
  
How familiar this was, but it was different now. When she moved, there was a hollow feeling. As if she was dancing steps meant to be performed in concert with another, but instead she was there on her own, awkwardly waiting for her partner to act and finding nothing happening. The power of the Fayth was no longer with her, and so Yuna had to put out of her mind that crutch she had used. Other Summoners had done what she had done. She should do the same. Her mind was strong enough to be a vessel for the mighty Aeons. Great creatures that could call destruction upon the strongest of enemies. She was the daughter of the High Summoner, a High Summoner herself. If her will was not strong enough, then no one's was strong enough.  
  
But the power was not there.  
  
She let out a breath, that turned into a cry midway. It wasn't working. She could feel the pyreflies struggling to fit into the designs she ordered them, but it wasn't working. And in an instant she knew why.  
  
She was trying to connect the armor to the ship, but it was not a living thing, and so the pyreflies ignored it. They would rather bind to her, but she was living and her body refused the changes. The mass of pyreflies trembled as one, a few breaking off and streaking to the heavens, perhaps to go seek their rest on the Farplane, tired of her.  
  
Yuna could feel the control of it all breaking up. There was no focus. There were no dreams of thousand year old Fayth to shape the pyreflies into form and function, and Yuna suddenly realised her great mistake. She was a Summoner. She could guide the pyreflies, but she could not bind them to her. She was a conduit, not the source or the destination.  
  
Her arms trembled from fatigue, and she was ready to drop the staff and give up.  
  
And then Yuna saw her, a little girl with blue hair, and flowers in her hands, and even as she danced, Yuna wept, mourning with the realisation of what this was about to cost her.  
  
The girl moved through the mass of pyreflies, and as the passed, the pyreflies cried out and flocked to her, or rather, to the dream, the tiny ill-formed dreams, that they could feel.  
  
Yuna wanted to stop. But she was only a conduit, and once she had begun a Summoning (and that was what it was, truly, now), she couldn't stop without being knocked unconscious, or killed.  
  
The girl danced, a clumsy unskilled imitation of Yuna's movements, though if anyone else had been able to see her, they would have remarked at her natural talent. As she moved and twirled, and flowers flung themselves from her grip, she began to change. It started with a lengthening of her arms and a narrowing of her body. Pyreflies clung to her, reshaping her as they could not Yuna.  
  
Veins that had lightly threaded her temples elongated, merging with hair that became glued to her body, a second skin that spread over her, becoming striations that smoothly ran over the lines of her body that was smoothly becoming greater, more luminous, more awe-inducing.  
  
She no longer looked quite like the little girl she had, more of a creature of light and shadow than anything else. But there was still a youthfulness to her countenance, an innocence that shone from her core. A soundless cry ran through the air, electrifying the very wind itself.  
  
A great bird hung in the air in the girl's stead, and Yuna knew from the screams and yelling that it was now visible to everyone else in the field of battle.  
  
Yuna stopped dancing, clutching the staff to her chest.  
  
"Stop them, my daughter," she whispered, before collapsing to the floor, unmoving.

* * *

A newly borne bird, easily as large as the creature Evrae, hovered in the air above the Al-Bhed airship. Each wing was as wide as the length of the body, the size becoming apparent as it unfurled its wings from where it had wrapped them tightly around its body. It threw them back, screaming soundlessly, as lightning crackled along its neck, wings, to gather at the beaktip on its oval, sightless head. It possessed no feathers, no claws, eyes, mouth or even an apparent skeleton. It was as if someone had seen a bird in silhouette, and tried to recreate it out of yellow-green clay.  
  
On the observation deck, no one spoke, staring in a mixture of awe and horror at what they were witnessing.  
  
On the bridge, Rikku couldn't, on the other hand, keep her silence. "Is... is that an Aeon?"  
  
"E ruba cu," said Brother. I hope so.  
  
Because if it wasn't an Aeon, and it wasn't on their side, they were all in very serious trouble.

* * *

By the lift, Isaaru caught sight of Yuna falling to the deck's surface on the monitor and knew, as no one else aboard could, what had just happened.  
  
He grit his teeth, and tried to be patient while the tech crew carefully carried on cutting through the metal that Yuna had welded shut.

* * *

With the manifestation of the unusual Aeon, Evrae was perhaps the only one on the field of battle to respond without puzzlement, without amazement. It was not a thinking creature, it was trained and bred to fight. And so fight it did.  
  
Evrae did not pause to regard the bird, but instead dove downwards, out of the sun, straight for the creature that held its position above the Al-Bhed airship. Surprised by the attack, the Aeon was caught up in the claws of the Wyrm, and the two went tumbling through the air. Evrae's razor sharp tail barely missed scoring across the upper deck, saving the unconscious Yuna from being bisected.  
  
The two twisted through the air, and then there was a brief, blinding flash of light, accompanied by a crack of energy, and Evrae shrieked, releasing the Aeon, which stabilised its flight with a deft flick of the wings. There was a faint scorching on Evrae's hide, and it moved one wing slightly stiffly.  
  
The Aeon, having regained its equilibrium, and no longer about to be taken by surprise, dove towards Evrae, one wing, etched in lightning energy and magic, scything towards Evrae's flank. The creature bellowed in defiance, swooping out of the way, and returning the impact with a raking of claws along what, on a true bird, would have been its tail feathers.  
  
The two traded blows, clawings, and magic was flung through the air with only the force that two unearthly creatures could summon.  
  
Evrae, it seemed was the first to tire of the back-and-forth impacts. It flew away, abandoning the flight in a manner that seemed to confuse the Aeon, which hung back, wary of being lead into a trap.  
  
Evrae climbed through the sky, higher and higher, and eventually it was possible to lose track of it. The Aeon surfed higher upon an air currently, energy crackling over its skin.  
  
It was the crack of what sounded like thunder that heralded Evrae's return, a loud thundering boom that shook the sky. It was what people would later realise was the Wyrm pouring all of its speed into a single attack, crashing through the sound barrier on a straight course for the strange Aeon.  
  
At the speed Evrae was going, if the Aeon had moved, the attack would have missed, and Evrae would have plummeted into the sea off the coast of the island, but the Aeon quite simply did not see the attack coming.  
  
It was hard to tell where one creature ended, and the other began. The sight in the skies above was little more than peridot and ruby intertwined, or there was an occasional flash of wing as one or the other tried to stabilise their wild ground-ward tumble.  
  
Attacks suddenly dropped off as the soldiers and mages on the ground realised that the gestalt mass was plummeting down towards them, and showed no signs of stopping. The tiny figures on the ground scattered, trying to reach safety in time. For all but a few of them, this sudden spiriting into flight was conducted in vain.  
  
The two great creatures fell (and it was impossible to tell which hit the towering stonework first), and slammed, with a great 'crack' like thunder, into the tallest of the three church towers. That might have been enough to take down the upper stories, but one or the other panicked, their claws scrabbling to find enough purchase to launch into the air again. Wings beat against walls, widening hairline fractures in the masonry.  
  
It seemed like only seconds, but it must have taken longer, but the tower started to collapse in on itself, taking the two winged beasts with it.  
  
Evrae was fairly quick to recover. As its claws hit the ground, it dug them into the tightly compacted earth and scrabbled out of the way, hauling itself out of the damaged building, and avoiding being caught by the stone that still fell. When it was clear, it shook itself off, and launched into the air with a defiant shriek, even it one apparently delicate wing seemed somewhat battered, and its tail was little more than a ragged ichor-soaked mess.  
  
The Aeon seemed the worse of of the two. It hovered, but it seemed uncertain in holding its position, dipping and rising almost with the breeze, its break drooping and its wing beats slow and tremulous. There was no way it could have landed. It had no claws. It would have never been able to take off again.  
  
But in spite of that, the bird seemed to be gathering a strength it had not possessed before. The brilliant blue lightning that crackled over its skin seemed even more excited than before, if that was possible.  
  
And then it started to turn.  
  
The sky grew dark.  
  
The Aeon seemed to be growing larger, but later, observers would recall it only as an illusion, as even as the surroundings grew darker, the Aeon grew brighter, as if it were drawing all of the light nearby into itself. Its wings wrapped around its body, turning it into a slender aerodynamic shape as it propelling itself upwards, rising nearly a hundred meters above Evrae.  
  
It flung back its wings when it reached the apex of its climb, in a manner so similar to that when it was Summoned, but this time, instead of moving to attack, it hovered there in mid-air, the lightning crackling over its body changing. The energy started to align along the striations that rippled over its skin, pooling at the wing tips, where they quickly became too bright to look at.  
  
Below, Evrae hovered, too confused about this enemy's new tactics to know what to do. This was never something that its teachers had trained it to handle.  
  
Thunder magic leapt from the wingtips to the blunted tip of the beak, the lines of energy forming an inverted V-shape. Energy poured forth from the Aeon, encasing the creature in a solid globe of light. By the time the wyrm realised the danger, it was too late to move away, and all on the ground and in the sky could hear the agonised shrieks of the creature as it lashed around inside a shifting mass of thunder, unable to move, fly, or even to breathe.  
  
Then, impossibly, the energy grew brighter, and the sphere started to contract.  
  
Evrae's screams became louder, and its thrashing could be dimly seen through the distorting influence of the lightning energy. Smaller and smaller the sphere became, until it reached some critical point, and a shockwave ripped through the sky from the very centre of the sphere of energy, where Evrae should have been.  
  
If anyone had been able to hear, they would have heard the gasps and cries of pain as several who had been looking in the direction of the light were flash-blinded, and stumbled to the floor, covering their eyes.  
  
Then the light was gone, and the sky was once again blue, seeming so unnatural after the pervasive darkness that had accompanied the Aeon's devastating attack. Silence reigned for a moment, and slowly eyes adapted, and were raised to see what had become of the battle.  
  
Evrae tumbled from the sky, wings twisted and unable to support the wyrm's weight. It fluttered downward like an iridescent ribbon, and a scant few meters above the sea, it broke apart, pyreflies streaming outwards and upwards, singing victoriously at their freedom. What was left passed beneath the waves, hardly causing a single ripple.  
  
The Aeon, if that was indeed what it was, hung in midair for a long moment, its wingtips drooping. The fact that the soldiers didn't take the opportunity to attack was an indication that they were all too stunned by Evrae's defeat to press their advantage.  
  
Then the Aeon flung its wings back, lightning crackling downward from the sky, the element seeming to restore the creature. And it turned.

* * *

"Amazing."  
  
It wasn't clear who said it, but Cid wasn't about to turn his head from the aerial battle playing out before them to seek out the speaker. Didn't mean he couldn't force other people's minds back onto business.  
  
"Stop gawking! What's happening with the army, with the fiends."  
  
There was the sense that Cid's words broke the spell that held the crew enthralled, and the sounds of people suddenly starting to move and breathe again filled the bridge.  
  
"The aftershock from that..."  
  
"Desperation attack?"  
  
"... Right. It seems to have wiped out the remaining flying fiends, and even took a chunk out of the ground troops."  
  
"Every Aeon has such an attack," It was Rikku speaking, one of the only Al-Bhed to have seen an Aeon repeatedly and at close range. "It leaves them vulnerable for a minute or so, but I think that Yevon missed the window."  
  
"It's... dying." It was Brother who spoke, falteringly, in the common tongue, and his hushed words silenced even his gruff father as the attention of those present was once again drawn outside of the airship.

* * *

Indeed that seemed to be the case. Even though the thunder magic had restored a little of the Aeon's spirit, it seemed that it simply wasn't enough. There was what looked like tiny tears in the hide of the Aeon, whisps of ethereal light wafting away on the breeze, followed by the occasional pyrefly as it broke away from the Aeon to seek its end on the Farplane. Its vibrant colour had faded, leaving it a sickly grey-green in shade, and it drifted oh-so-slowly towards the final tower with an air of resigned determination, though how they could discern such things was a peculiarity that none gave much thought to at that moment.  
  
It floated lower, barely moving its wings to keep it from plummeting to the ground, and moved closer to the tower. Finally, the belly of the Aeon came into contact with the outer stone walls, and it stopped. Its wingbeats halted completely, but before it could fall, the Aeon wrapped its wings around the tower, nearly, though not quite encompassing the structure. That said much for the wingspan of the creature. Hugging the tower, the Aeon didn't move for a very long moment, at least, not in a manner apparent to any observer.  
  
It was the sound of cracking masonry that gave the first sign of what it was the Aeon was doing, and the sound seemed to stir the troops out of the stunned stupor many of them had succumbed to. They could not be blamed. Surely they had never thought to see an Aeon turn against them.  
  
The sound was like thunder, rolling far away, though the grinding noise that followed as chunks of carved stone started to fall away dispelled any ideas of bad weather.  
  
The soldiers started to fire, flashes of light showing where the bullets impacted on the Aeon and where the torn 'flesh' returned to the state of pyrefly fragments, drifting away on the breeze. But it was too little, too late.  
  
There was a soft sound, a sigh mixed with a moan, and the grip of the Aeon about the central tower started to slacken. As the only thing that had been holding the crumbling stones in position fell away, so did the stonework, and, with a crack that rivaled the thunder that the Aeon had been casting right, left and centre, the building started to collapse, burying the Aeon under the falling bricks, as well as a good portion of the soldiers too slow to get out of the way in time.  
  
Dust and debris blew out in every direction as the building crumbled, obscuring sight for a long moment.  
  
And then, even as the dust settled, buried in the rubble the shape of the Aeon became translucent, fading gently, and pyreflies streamed away to dissolve the body. The only thing that marked the passing of the Aeon was the tumbling of a few more rocks as the creature they had pinned simply vanished into the aether, leaving behind a scene of utter devastation.

* * *

The fighting had stopped. With the destruction of their buildings, and the deaths of most of their comrades, the soldiers had seemed to lose heart in the battle, leaving the airship unmolested as it hung precariously in the air, hydraulic fluids and oil lines leaking ponderously from gouges in the hull.  
  
Inside, Isaaru waited impatiently as the Al-Bhed finished burning through the metal of the reinforced hatchway. He dove through the narrow gap the moment the metal plating fell away, clanging loudly against the deck plates. Behind him he could hear shouting in Al-Bhed, calls for medics, and hurried questions of what was going on. He recognised one of the voices as Yuna's young cousin, but he ignored the shouting of his name as he scrambled up the emergency ladder that lead all the way up the lift shaft to the hatch that gave the access to the deck. Fortunately, the manual lever was working here, and it slid open obediently under his touch.  
  
Yuna lay in the middle of the deck, her hair spread out in a fan-like pattern about her head. Underneath her, originating from beneath her skirt if the stain on her dress was any indication, a pool of dark blood slowly spread outwards, dribbling along the deck in different directions as the ship tilted to keep moving.  
  
"Oh no," Isaaru said, realising what had happened. He knew. He knew like no one else could, knew what had happened, and what the cost had been. "Yuna, no..."  
  
He heard a scrabbling behind him as two sets of footsteps finally followed him.  
  
Rikku was soon onto the deck after the pair, two Al-Bhed medics, who looked like they could use a healer's services themselves, following along with a medical kit and a stretcher. "How is she?" she asked Isaaru anxiously, wringing her hands.  
  
Isaaru got up from his kneeling position as the medics tried to gently manhandle the High Summoner onto the makeshift stretcher. "Not good," he said quietly, sounding more shaken than he looked. "I think," he added quietly, with a catch in his voice, "I think she's lost her baby."  
  
And then he followed the medics belowdecks to see to Yuna's injuries.

* * *

Rikku couldn't move, frozen in place as she was by the news of her cousin's probable miscarriage. "Yuna was pregnant?" She asked the wind, for lack of anyone else to speak to. She stared in disgusted fascination at the pool of blood that was threatening to run off the edge of the deck.  
  
The enormity of the situation suddenly collapsed down upon her shoulders, and Rikku found herself falling to her knees on the deck, hand pressed over her mouth.  
  
A hand fell upon her shoulder, and she looked up to see Lulu.  
  
"You should have told me," she said, quietly. "There was so much more going on that I knew, than any of us knew."  
  
Lulu hesitated, then nodded slowly.  
  
Rikku took a deep breath, and got to her feet, raising her chin slightly to give the black mage a steady gaze. "You didn't tell me," she said, "You should have. You guys got my pops and the people on this ship involved in something that we didn't know everything about. I'll do anything for Yuna, you know that. But don't ever even think about putting the people on this ship in danger without telling them /everything/ again. Because, Lulu, so help me, I will make sure that no Al-Bhed gives you the time of day ever again."  
  
Rikku started to march off the deck, but Lulu's sudden "Rikku!" called her back.  
  
The black mage was glaring at her, and the woman's crimson gaze was tinged with an anger that Rikku hadn't expected. Shame, she had expected, perhaps, or even amusement at Rikku's words. Anger, though, had not been what she thought would happen. Lulu so rarely got angry.  
  
"What would you have done if you had known? Told Yuna to keep out of it? Or would it have made no difference at all?" Lulu tilted her head, walking slowly over to the Al-Bhed girl. "Perhaps you should be honest with yourself. You're angry because no one told /you/. You feel left out. Everyone on this ship would still have fought even if they knew that Yuna was carrying a baby. They would have fought if they'd been under the impression that Yuna was really a Ronso with a very good shave. Don't you dare use your wounded pride as some sort of reason why Wakka and I should feel ashamed for doing our duty as friends and defending Yuna's privacy."  
  
Rikku lowered her eyes, staring at the deck.  
  
"It's Seymour's child, did you know that?"  
  
Rikku blanched.  
  
"So now you know everything," Lulu said quietly, folding her arms. "Now go and be the Guardian, friend and family to Yuna that you should be, and don't you even think of breathing a word of your childish dissatisfaction with being 'out of the loop' to her."  
  
Rikku's voice was soft, barely audible. "I'm sorry," she whispered.  
  
Lulu grunted. "Just go."  
  
Rikku practically ran from the deck.  
  
Lulu turned her head to stare at the blood, before she raised a hand and used the last of her magical energy to conjure a water spell that expunged the blood from the deck's surface. Satisfied that it was gone, she turned and followed Rikku belowdecks.  
  
Yuna needed her.  
  
- End of Part Fifteen 

Idle note: I hate, loathe and DESPISE the fact that deletes all the dividers, thus the reason the formatting is mucky. I would suggest that anyone wanting to see the story as I want it to be seen has a look at my website.


	16. Epilogue: For All Things

* * *

Epilogue: For All Things

* * *

The Summoner's staff swung in a graceful arc, scooping up a particularly tenacious clump of pyreflies and dispersing them into the air, adding new voices to the chorus that resounded throughout the ruins of a Yevon compound. Isaaru, former Summoner-Protector of Bevelle, stepped gracefully through the dance, his bare feet passing over rocks and shattered glass, and yet his face did not flicker as the shrapnel cut into the soles of his feet. Summoners danced upon water, through fire, sometimes in unnaturally precarious stances atop stone cairns that no normal Human could have held. Little broken shards would hardly bother one of them.  
  
There was a weariness on his face, a certain resignation, a face that had seen too much and longed to see no more. There were dark patches staining his sleeves, and his hands. If he had been wearing his over-tunic, doubtless it would have been covered by a rusty-hued discoloration.  
  
Shelinda marveled that she could discern such things through the grainy images of a hurriedly filmed sphere recording.  
  
She watched the face of the man she was showing it to; she had already seen the recording, many times in fact, and the motions of the Summoner and his Sending were tattooed into her memory. As was the sad look upon the face of the young Al-Bhed girl (was her name Rikky?) as she had pushed the sphere into Shelinda's hands.  
  
"You made sure we knew the truth," the girl had muttered, "Now make sure everyone else does."  
  
Shelinda hadn't known quite what to do with the sphere, especially after she had seen it, and felt her stomach turn to ice at its content. She had walked out of Bevelle, abandoning her post as Captain of the Guard without a second thought and taking to the road. She walked and walked, more in a trance than anything, her mind churning as she tried to think what to do with this incendiary material.  
  
She blinked as the lighting in the room changed. The sphere recording had changed from an exterior view to one of a plain, unadorned chamber, and in it was a priestess, young by the looks of her, relating the plans of the Yevon church, in regards to the army they had been building in their secret island base, and what it had been used for.  
  
Shelinda had been mulling on just this scene when she had made her decision. She had hitched a ride with a caravan of traveling traders, and they had made the trip from the Moonflow to Luca while Shelinda had been with them, trading her healing services for passage. At Luca she had disembarked, wandering around, and it had been as she walked around the docks, looking at the ships, that she had glanced up and seen the Sphere, and the local news that it was displaying.  
  
An hour later, she had been standing in the office of one of the largest Sphere Network broadcasters in Luca, showing the recording to Jameso, the Editor-in-Chief of the organisation, a corpulent man who had practically walked through a wall to get to her when he realised what Shelinda had with her.  
  
The recording was in its last phase: a short word from the Lady High Summoner about what had happened, the battle, and what they had stopped. The young girl looked grey-skinned and shaky. The recording was taken with her lying on a bed. Shelinda hoped that whatever injuries Lady Yuna had suffered during the battle were not too serious.  
  
The room darkened as the sphere recording came to an end, and the projection disappeared. Shelinda shook her head to lessen the disorientation of suddenly being returned to reality, and tried not to twist her fingers in anxiety as Jameso plucked the sphere from his desktop, turning the pale blue object over in his hands. He looked at her, and Shelinda held her breath.  
  
Jameso shook the sphere recording, gripping it tightly in one meaty fist. "You know what this is, girl? This is like a firaga spell in a box! This is explosive! This could be the end of the Yevon church as we know it!!"  
  
Shelinda grit her teeth. The remnants of her devout faith quailed within her at what she was doing. But when she had learned the truth, she knew that she could no longer bear to serve such a corrupt organisation. "I know. I'm sorry for what I'm showing you, but I cannot-"  
  
But she broke off as Jameso laughed, a short sharp bark that sounded more like the victorious yelp of a fiend than an expression of mirth. Shelinda thought that quite appropriate, what with the feral grin the man was sporting. "Sorry? Why in the name of all that's holy are you sorry, girl? This is the stuff that journalists dream of! We'll be the only Sphere Network to carry the truth, the real truth! Think of the viewership! I think we now know why we've had all those clergy types mysteriously resigning en masse. It's a conspiracy, I tell you, a conspiracy just waiting to be uncovered! And reported on! By us!!" He leaned forward, that grin still firmly in place and, if that was possible, growing larger. "You ever think of becoming a journalist, girl?"  
  
Feeling unaccountably pleased, Shelinda found herself smiling.

* * *

It was night time in the Bevelle region. Ismene, a priestess, or rather, former-priestess, of the Yevon church, was not to be found in that holy city, however. She had removed herself to a small mountain outpost, little more than a cabin with only two rooms, that lay to the west of the Sacred Mountain, Mount Gagazet. Far enough that she could be safe from the mobs that now tore through the Temples, shrieking with anger and rage at the depth of the betrayal that Yevon, with she at its head, had planned to perpetrate against them. Sphere Networks all over Spira carried the story now, the images and testimonies of an army ready to kill, and the confessions of key members of the church who had gone along with Ismene's plans to keep the populace in line burned into their collective consciousness.  
  
Acolytes reported burned their robes to prevent themselves being identified with the church. Priests and Priestesses who wouldn't give up their faith went into hiding, lest the masses get to them. There had already been reports of deaths. Mostly they had been accidental, people crushed by falling masonry as people attacked the iconography in the lesser temples, or there were the weak who were unable to follow the crowds and had wound up trampled. But there had been cases where panicked warrior monks turned their machina weapons upon rioters, after those same rioters had torn apart a compatriot.  
  
Spira was in turmoil. But it would pass, Ismene was certain. Their shock would pass, their grief and denial would die down, and acceptance would creep back in. They would see what had become of them when they turned on the church. The world would hurt, but with time the pain would be but a memory, and they would return to what had sustained them. The riots were the fault of the faithless, the heretics, and Spira would see that.  
  
And so Ismene slept easy, under a rough blanket and atop a lumpy straw-filled mattress.  
  
She did not, however, foresee that she would be awoken in that very dark hour, just before the sun starts to move towards the dawn, at the very darkest point of the night where the starlight is enough to see by, and there is an eerie stillness to the air.  
  
Ismene heard the soft noise on the edge of her consciousness, and it was enough to nudge her into wakefulness. She froze, barely daring to breath, as she listened with every fibre of her being. She heard the sound of something large, but soft of tread, resettle itself upon the creaking floorboards.  
  
She opened her eyes and sat up in bed, the hessian blanket falling away, leaving her exposed to the chill of night. Ranged around her bed, she could see six pairs of lambent amber eyes reflecting starlight. There was the glimpse of dark fur, but it was too dark for her to discern the colour properly.  
  
She didn't need to wonder what had happened to the two warrior monks who had supposedly been on guard in the adjoining room.  
  
"Yevon Priestess hurt Lady Yuna," said a deep, growling voice, "No longer."  
  
Ismene closed her eyes slowly and shook her head. It wasn't fair. It simply wasn't fair.

* * *

Yuna stood surrounded by pyreflies, and the pyreflies, for their part, studiously ignored her. Here she was again. She had returned to the Farplane, attempting to find the sense of closure she had felt before. But it hadn't felt this painful before.  
  
Perhaps she needed more time, argued Lulu, backed up by Cid, of all people. Grief and pain did not leave one overnight. She was allowed her time.  
  
It was because her grief was still fresh that she needed to go, she had argued in return. If she waited to long, she would never be able to screw up enough courage to return.  
  
In the end, they reluctantly agreed, but had forced her to wait until at least a month had past without another outbreak of violence occurring.  
  
Spira had been shaken to its very core by the revelations of what the church had planned for them. Violence had erupted, and barely a day went past without hearing of another riot around one of the temples, of an attack upon a follower of Yevon, or even of defacing of religious statues. The only places that had emerged unscathed had been the Fayth Temples. Apparently the people of Spira held the Summoners in even greater reverence now than in the past, now that the truth was out about what they had been forced to serve under, and yet still sacrificed their lives for the people.  
  
Yuna felt a certain amount of relief. She could not have borne the thought of her father's statue being dishonored, damaged or destroyed.  
  
Slowly, though, it seemed that the collective anger of Spira had burned itself out, the people seeming to wake up to the fact that the old religion was gone. The priests had either been killed in the riots, or they had fled. Ismene, the head of the conspiracy, had simply disappeared. Many of the younger students of Yevon renounced their faith, many publicly, proclaiming themselves to be in the service of Spira now. But there were mutterings, now that time had lessened the pain, that a few of the devout young acolytes would continue practicing their religion, but conscious of its flaws, with the aim of correcting the mistakes of Yevon's past.  
  
Yuna didn't care. She never intended to be associated with Yevon ever again. Or even to be associated with the conflict. Thankfully, in the confusion, her role within it had seemed to be forgotten. People were more concerned with their own lives now, what they were to do without the church, without Sin, and the violence had seemed to jog them into realising that they were responsible for the future. There had been no calls to her home on Besaid Island. And for that Yuna was grateful.  
  
She had needed time to shed her own tears, to throw her own pots, to beat her fists uselessly against Isaaru and Wakka and Cid, and for Rikku and Lulu to stroke her hair, hold her, and mutter nonsense at her to calm her when she awoke in the night sobbing. Even though the tears had stopped now, Yuna knew she would never be over the loss of her daughter.  
  
But she wondered if she could find some closure.  
  
Yuna climbed the stairs to the Farplane viewing platform. She knew that she was the only one there; the Guado guard had made a comment about no one choosing to visit the Farplane at 'this time of night'. Which was precisely why Yuna had chosen to come then. Rikku had insisted on accompanying her, and the girl was fully armed, protected and ready for action. She was determined not to let anything happen this time, even to the degree of following Yuna as she made to enter the Farplane proper.  
  
When Yuna had expressed her shock, Rikku stubbornly said that no silly memories were going to get in the way of protecting her cousin. So she followed, even if it was at a distance.  
  
Butterflies fluttered in Yuna's stomach as she ascended, a lump sitting in her throat that she couldn't swallow past. She reached the top step, and stopped dead.  
  
A little girl, with blue hair and a faint tracery of veins about her temples, the mismatched eyes of her mother, and holding the flowers of the Farplane clutched in her hands, stood in the centre of the viewing platform, pyreflies drifting around her, one or two dangling from the braids in her hair, giving her movements iridescent trails as she bounced upon the balls of her feet cheerfully.  
  
Yuna fell to her knees. Rikku shifted nervously behind her, unable to see what Yuna saw, being as she was below the level of the platform. Yuna waved her back with barely a thought, not even turning, and unable to stop tears running down her face. The most she had hoped for was a faint clustering of pyreflies, the barest hint of an essence that was the unborn child she had carried. She realised now how she should have known better. Her daughter had dreamed, had been the power behind an Aeon, how could she not be here, full formed?  
  
It was perfectly possible, Isaaru had gently explained to her, when she had finally ask him, that her child had become a Fayth. Now he knew the truth of Lady Yunalesca, and the Final Aeons, he had quickly realised what Yuna had done. Summoners could manipulate pyreflies, yes, and forge armor, but Yuna had realised that she had not been deceased, and so could not alter her own body to accept a grafting of armor. But the the substance of every living thing was those glowing motes of life. When Yunalesca created the Final Aeon, she had bound the Summoners to to their Guardians, had made the Summoners realise the dreams, and direct the pyreflies of the Guardian to become those great creatures. What was left of the Guardian was nothing more than stone and hollow rock, with only dreams left to sustain them, and when the dream ended, they faded.  
  
Yuna had done what only Yunalesca had ever done. She had created a Fayth, and it had been her daughter.  
  
Yunalesca had chosen her husband, Zaon, for the bond that bound them was strong enough. And Yuna had, unconsciously, chosen her daughter. Their bond was closer than anything that could be achieved, after all, Yuna carried her daughter within her. She had enabled her daughter's dreams to become reality, binding her daughters pyreflies to those of the surrounding air, granting power that such a young life should not have possessed.  
  
It could not be sustained. The child had only one dream, and once it was over, she had faded, and died. The trauma had nearly sent Yuna to follow her. Only Isaaru's healing skills, and the expert emergency care of the Al-Bhed medics had ensured her survival.  
  
Yuna wanted to run to the girl, jump over the side of the viewing platform, perhaps, and join her daughter. But something held her back. She imagined she heard a voice, whispering over the song. Her father perhaps? Her mother? Not her time to join them, she knew. She would be strong, because she had to.  
  
But Yuna still wept, even though her throat refused to give voice to her sobs.  
  
And then she saw something that surprised her.  
  
She had only ever seen static images on the Farplane. Figures hovered over the side of the platform. Sometimes they shifted slightly, as if uncomfortable at holding one position to long, like anyone having to pose for a family sphere recording would do. There was a slight impatience, an intolerance of having to deal with the living, that she had always experienced. As if the phantoms were humoring them, but really, they did want to get back to being dead and ethereal.  
  
Perhaps what she saw, she saw because she was the only one there to see, or perhaps Yuna was hallucinating.  
  
Never before had she seen a phantom sweep across the platform, to grasp another in its arms and twirl it in the air. The girl's mouth opened in silent laughter, and flowers flew from her grip as her father swung her in the air before setting her in his arms and turning towards Yuna. Her chest felt tight as she realised she had forgotten to breath.  
  
Seymour regarded her for a long, solemn moment. Then he closed his eyes and bowed his head slightly in acknowledgment.  
  
Behind them, ghostly images formed from the Farplane mist. A hooded child, three sisters, a man and his dog, her father and mother, a man in a red coat, a woman with a spiny bracelet, others. Their eyes bore into Yuna's very soul, and she heard their voices whisper through the song.  
  
/She is family. She will be loved./  
  
And then they were gone.  
  
"Yunie! Oh no! Yunie, are you alright?"  
  
Yuna cracked open her eyes, and realised from the uncomfortable kink in her spin that she was lying at an awkward angle on the Farplane's platform, her cousin anxiously kneeling over her.  
  
"Guh?" she asked, inarticulately.  
  
"You just kinda keeled over," Rikku said, grasping Yuna's arm to help the High Summoner to her feet. "You okay?"  
  
"I'm... I'm fine."  
  
"Good, but... um... maybe we should, you know, get out of here. This place gives me the creeps."  
  
Yuna smiled at her cousin, and made an effort to scrub the tear streaks from her face. "That's okay. I think I've seen everything I need to."

* * *

She found Isaaru at the banks of the Moonflow, crouched down, watching the sheer beauty that was the river at night.  
  
"All done?" he asked, his voice deceptively light.  
  
"I think so," Yuna said, rubbing her arms against the chill of the night. She had packed a shawl, but had failed to bring it out with her. "Are you coming back to Besaid with us?"  
  
Isaaru stood up, his knees making cracking sounds with the movement. "I think you'll do just fine without me, Yuna."  
  
Yuna nodded slowly, biting her lip as she looked over the beautiful vista of the Moonflow. "What are you going to do now?" she asked quietly. It would have been selfish to ask him to stay, she knew, simply because she had grown accustomed to his presence.  
  
"I don't know. Go find my brothers, maybe."  
  
"That's not what I meant."  
  
Isaaru smiled slowly. "You mean, what is the answer to the same question that every Summoner asked themselves when they realised that Summoners were no longer needed? I'm not sure. Maybe I'll go out, get a job fishing in Kilika. Maybe I'll get married. Maybe I'll get a dog." He gave her a sidelong look. "Maybe not."  
  
Yuna glanced away, pressing her lips together to stifle her smirk.  
  
"Whichever way it goes, I do want to thank you, Yuna." He approached her, laying his hand on her shoulders. "For, if nothing else, showing me the folly of doing what people tell me."  
  
Yuna had no tears. She had cried herself out on the Farplane, but she still threw her arms around him, barely able to stretch them about the bulk of his robes, and she felt the gentle squeeze as he returned the embrace. She didn't even object when, as he drew away, he placed a chaste kiss upon her cheek.  
  
"I'll see you around, Lady Yuna," he said, before drawing away, and starting away down the bank towards where the Shoopuff sat waiting to take passengers across the wide river.  
  
Yuna turned back to the Moonflow, and wasn't sure how long it was until she heard the footsteps of the girl she had told to wait for her back in Guadosalam.  
  
"Yunie?" Rikku walked up to her cousin's side, following her eyes outwards to see what it was Yuna was looking at. When she failed to see anything noteworthy, she frowned and looked at Yuna's profile. "Ready to go?"  
  
Yuna took a deep breath. "Yes," she said, "I'm ready to go home."  
  
- The End. 


End file.
